Since November 2017, Zimbabwe’s new administration has been promoting FDI and international re-engagement. Potential FDI now tops US$3billion while several deputations have been to Harare as part of the re-engagement effort. Last week, Government hosted a United States delegation comprising Mr Adrian T. Bogart III (National Security Council director for African Affairs), Mr Thomas Hastings (deputy director of Southern African Affairs at the State Department), Ms Pamela Ward (regional senior commercial officer) and Mr Mark Billera (USAid deputy director for Southern Africa). The Sunday Mail and Zimpapers Television Network spoke to Mr Hastings and US Ambassador to Zimbabwe Mr Harry Thomas Jnr regarding that visit.

***

Mr Thomas Hastings

The four of us spent last week in South Africa – because, of course, that’s one of the key countries in the region – looking at ways we can strengthen our relationship with South Africa, especially at this time.

We felt it was very important, given the moment that Zimbabwe is at right now, to come up and visit Zimbabwe as well. So, we arrived on Monday. We have had a very full and interesting visit. We were received by President Mnangagwa, which was an honour that he gave us some of his time.

And our message with the President and everyone we’ve met – Government officials and others – has been very simple: we are very optimistic about Zimbabwe. We think Zimbabwe has a great opportunity right now to put itself on a new and positive path, and the United States would like to join in that and help it do so.

At the same time, the key actions that must take place really rest with the Government of Zimbabwe. For there to be a changed relationship, there must be change which takes place on the ground here in Zimbabwe.

The first among those changes is, of course, the overwhelming importance of an election – coming up in a few months in July or August – which is free, fair, credible and non-violent. We had a conversation about that.

Ambassador Harry Thomas Jnr met with the President last week as well and had a conversation on that same theme. So, we reiterated those points.

We are also interested in economic reforms. Zimbabwe has tremendous economic potential. We know that there are US companies which – looking ahead – would like to get involved in Zimbabwe. Some of them spoke to us in South Africa; some of them spoke to me in America and they are asking our opinions about the country.

So, we conveyed that to the Government. We, basically, asked Government officials whom we met with what plans they are putting in place to improve the economic situation in this country so that it can get itself back onto a more positive path and attract foreign investors.

Those were the general themes of our visit.

Well, we met the President, Vice-President Mohadi and the Foreign Minister together. Again, we were largely stressing the importance of the elections. We have indicated out desire to send monitors for those elections and we received a clear signal from the Government that that would be welcomed.

So, we are happy about that.

It’s important that when you talk about election monitors that you’ll be talking about not only Election Day, but also (part) of the period before the election. That’s when the preparations and systems are put in place to ensure that the people of Zimbabwe really have the opportunity to express themselves freely.

That seemed to be received well also.

We want to do all we can to enable a free and fair election. We think that when international observers are allowed in that builds the credibility of the election. The fact of inviting observers into your country when you are having an election does add to the credibility of the exercise.

It singles out lessons that can be improved upon next time because no election is perfect. So, any election that’s going to have observers . . . they are probably going to identify things that can be improved upon. I think it’s in Zimbabwe’s own interest to welcome the international community to be part of this process.

US$15 billion promise to MDC-T: That’s not true. There’s been no promise of financial assistance to any political party after the election. It’s not the approach we take. But we want these elections to be free and fair and to be open to all parties, and we look forward to working with whatever administration emerges after these elections.

Impressions: Our impressions, ultimately, aren’t what matters. What’s going to matter is the Zimbabwean people who get a chance to cast their vote in July or August. But for what it’s worth, I think what we can say is President Mnangagwa and his Cabinet members are saying many of the right things and we are encouraged by that.

But following that initial message, there must come action. And so, we will still wait and see; follow and see what the actions are. I can tell you that the President said that he intends to take on corruption; that he recognises that it’s a problem in the country.

We are pleased to hear that and the President sending that message from the highest level is the necessary first step. But that doesn’t mean corruption disappears overnight as soon as the President says it. There will be a lot of hard work to address that problem in the months and – let’s be honest – years ahead to change those sorts of problems.

I can tell you that the Trump administration is looking at Africa as a region of opportunity and any country that seems to be putting itself on a path of more democracy, more openness to international business is going to be a partner we are eager to work with.

Sanctions: I’m glad you raised that because I think there’s been a little bit of misunderstanding. There was a move – a few weeks ago – to extend the existing sanctions that are in place. This is actually an annual renewal of sanctions that have been in place since President George W. Bush.

Whenever the US government has a sanctions programme in place, there has to be that automatic renewal every year just to keep it going. So, that’s all that it was a few weeks ago. I believe it was reported in one of the newspapers here that it was new sanctions being placed against President Mnangagwa.

That’s actually not true. There’s been no change in our sanctions since November: no new sanctions, no lifted sanctions. As of now, the policy has remained unchanged.

We would definitely like to see a day come on which our relationship with Zimbabwe can be much more normalised without sanctions. As I said at the beginning, though, changes have to occur here before that change can take place in our relationship.

No sanctions programme is permanent. We have had sanctions against many countries in the world and you’ve seen that as changes have taken place in Burma, Sudan and even Cuba our policies change as well. So, over the long term, that’s the trajectory we would hope for Zimbabwe.

But again, it comes back to the Zimbabwe Government holding a free and fair election; the Zimbabwe Government respecting and protecting the rights of Zimbabweans, rights that are already written into your Constitution. They just have to be implemented. And then, of course, the types of economic reforms that would repair the economic relationships that Zimbabwe has with other countries.

Everything we’ve been saying here, everything we communicated to your President on Monday is consistent with the sanctions laws that we have in America. The Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act has a section which specifically says these sanctions can be removed if there are the following things which have taken place: a free and fair election, the end to intimidation and violence, the establishment of the rule of                                                                                       law.

(These are) basic principles which are not US ideas. These are international standards about what democracy and well-functioning government should look like. So, yes, if the Government of Zimbabwe takes the steps we have been talking about, we could see a time when the situation changes with regard to sanc-                         tions.

Positives: There are positive initial signs and we are going to continue to watch from now until July or August and hopefully see more of those and see some of the very positive initial statements being followed through by action as well. For example, the fact that the President has said that he wants a free and fair election; the fact that we received an indication that Americans will be permitted to come as monitors, which has not been the case in the past. Those are positives.

The fact that the voter registration period was extended – we view that as a positive sign.

There have been indications on the economic side that the Government realises it needs to make some changes to certain laws or policies that have created uncertainty and probably kept investors away from Zimbabwe. Those are positives. It’s still early days, so these need to be followed through.

We can talk about a certain law and say that it needs to be changed, but until Parliament takes action, the law is still the same. International companies are going to see what the law actually says. It’s nice to hear that it’s going to be changed, but they want to hear what the law actually says.

So, there’s still going to be a process of implementation that’s going to have to follow through some of these statements.

Investment: I can’t quantify it. We were in South Africa for a week and whenever we mentioned to a US company that we were travelling next week to Zimbabwe, they were right away asking, “Oh, how do you see Zimbabwe?”

They were interested and so on. But that’s not a quantifiable sample. What I can tell you is that most companies are still in a wait-and-see mode. US companies, like any international companies, want to invest where there is basic safety and security, and I just don’t mean security in terms of violence but security of investment.

They want to know that they are going to be able to invest in a country and if they begin to do well and make profits, the Government isn’t going to seize those profits in some way. They want to know that the rule of law is established and that the rules are clear for every com-                                                                                      pany.

Honestly, the reputation of Zimbabwe in the past has not been strong on those points. So, it takes time to build confidence again and repair the reputation.

***

Ambassador Harry Thomas Jnr

We were very excited that General Electric came. And even better, they are going to come back soon! They are looking at infrastructure projects. We will have to see what details there are. We were pleased they met with the Parliament and Cabinet (members).

I think that’s key as we go forward.

They’ll make the decisions that are in their best interest and also on how they can best help the people of Zimbabwe because you want jobs, you want power. So, GE can be key to that because, of course, they were very involved in Hwange years ago.

I don’t think they will (outline the scale of investment to us) but will to the Government of Zimbabwe. The important thing that you should be excited about is that they came and that they are coming back.

A company as large as GE takes time to make decisions. They have to talk to everybody there. But I think it’s positive that they came; the most important thing for them is: can they get their money out? What are the property rights? Those things will be key.

But we are very encouraged that they were here and that they are coming back.

Who else is coming? We know this: American firms are asking us, calling us in droves. We know that there will be, in coming months, American firms that are part of investment missions being put together now.

And I think they will join our German, British colleagues who are bringing investment firms, or our Italian colleagues who took Zimbabweans to Italy. But let’s remember this: Under my distinguished predecessor, Ambassador Bruce Wharton; he took a group of Zimbabweans to the United States a few years ago to look at investment.

We will encourage them to go again to talk to American businesses about the new dispensation, what is possible under that new dispensation. We’ve been told that Zimbabwe itself is looking to have investment conferences in New York, London and Washington; and we would welcome that.

***

MrThomas Hastings

(The delegation’s composition) is absolutely a signal. There’s no way a delegation would have come probably a year or two years ago because frankly, there wouldn’t have been that much for us to say or talk about.

There was not a sense that things were moving in a positive direction in this country. Right now, there is a sense that there is potential to move in a very positive direction. And so we want to be supportive of that; we want to be engaged.

To my knowledge, this was not something that President Trump himself ordered. The National Security Council, in conversation with the State Department, USAid and Commerce, agreed that it would be good to have Zimbabwe as part of this trip.

Our relations are not just about Harare-Washington relations. More broadly, relations between the Zimbabwean people and the United States are excellent, very deep and broad. I know the US was the first country to establish an embassy here after Independence.

I visited Zimbabwe in 1992 when I was a back-packer, a tourist. I travelled all over the country. I was struck by, of course, the beauty of the country and also the friendliness of the people.

That hasn’t changed.

I’ve been learning this week how many Zimbabweans travel to the US and study at some of the best universities we have; which are the best in the world. So, there is a very rich relationship between the American people and the Zimbabwean people.

Where the relationship has been a bit more difficult has been on the government side because this has been a difficult 20 years.

We are optimistic that that’s about to change. We want to be a part of that change.

***

Ambassador Harry Thomas Jnr

Africans and the whole world are invited to observe American elections.

So, anybody who (says none of them is allowed) is extremely wrong. We welcome the new Zec chairperson (Justice Priscilla Chigumba). She’s a respected jurist. I think that she is committed to free and fair elections.

We welcome the fact that President Mnangagwa is going to operate elections in accordance with the law. But just as important, the United States is very committed to having American businesses come here and visit and see if they can help you with jobs.

Everybody I meet talks about jobs; having their children come home; having the Diaspora come home and establishing businesses. You know, every Zimbabwean has three, four degrees. Why not every Zimbabweans have three, four, five functioning businesses?

And we think with the technology, the innovation in America that there’ll be success and we can partner with you in them. So, we are committed to jobs. President Trump always says America is open for business.

We know Zimbabwe is open for business and let’s try and make that happen together.

Watch video at www.ztn.co.zw

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Richard Mahomva
In the same manner, Tsvangirai could not give up power even in the most chronic state of his health. This proves that the MDC-T has survived under autocratic terms of power with Tsvangirai being the party’s unquestionable central figure of power.

In the selective desertion of the truth, MDC seems to have rose as an innocent political alternative to the dominance of nationalism.

True to its misleading existentiality, MDC in its various factions has earned relevance as a redemptive option to the one-party state politics which defined Zimbabwe in the first decade of our independence.

In some quotas, Tsvangirai has been revered as a founding cornerstone of Zimbabwean pluralism and democracy – without whom there would be no democracy in Zimbabwe.

In last week’s article, I discussed how Tsvangirai’s acclaimed inclinations to “democracy” had no empirical connection to the founding principle of our struggle.

His character as a democrat is worth less praise compared to particular political icons, especially the country’s founding nationalists like Father Zimbabwe, General Tongogara, Herbert Chitepo, Ziyaphapha-Moyo.

Unlike Tsvangirai, these had a clearly defined line of defending the true liberation of the African populace.

Tsvangirai’s proposition of democracy was centred on popularising the vanguard of coloniality which was alienated by the “Third-Chimurenga”.

Therefore, the rise of the MDC in 1999 was not solely inclined to advancing an alternative to political repression that Zimbabwe is said to have suffered since 1980.

MDC stands as a resistant symbol of the nationalist agenda and that constitutes the mega contradiction of the party’s claim to democracy in Zimbabwe.

Though Zimbabweans across the political divide paid their last respects to Cde Morgan Tsvangirai, it must be clarified that Tsvangirai’s association with democracy must be approached with hesitancy.

Moreover, anecdotal to depict him as the only prominent forerunner of pluralism in Zimbabwe.

The late Edgar Tekere is another opposition leader who challenged the Mugabe rule.

Therefore, it is a crime to truth to limit the memory of pluralism to the late Tsvangirai.

History and the ideological paradox burden

As also highlighted in last week’s article, Tsvangirai’s legacy as a trade-unionist cannot be evaluated in isolation of the broader trade-unionist tradition of Zimbabwe.

One of the realities contesting his legacy fallacy in this respect derives from the role played by anti-colonial trade unionists.

Their role in the fight against colonial capitalism dating back as far as 1920 right up to the maturation stage of African resistance in the late 1940s is still unparalleled.

MDC’s misleading manipulation of the democracy and human-rights rhetoric in defence of White land ownership further substantiates the party’s link to trade-unionism as vulgarity to the dignity of Africans to embrace a status of being mere “workers”.

Therefore, the claim by Tsvangirai’s MDC to be a “workers party” broadly articulates the opposition’s determination to cultivate a culture of black subjugation.

The same culture which has blatantly dignified the sub-humanity of Africans as a race of workers – people with no capacity to control the means of production, with no command of their destiny, but are mere owners of labour.

This further probes MDC’s self-preservation as a cornerstone of trade-unionism and democracy considering its founding objective to reverse the gains of the land reform.

Ideally, liberating land ownership was going to widely cascade to other sectors of the economy and help in deconstructing the idolisation of Africans’ exploitative statuses to White capital.

Consequently, MDC in its current coalesced formation and in its possible renewal or break-ups will perpetuate its paradoxical claim to defending democracy and the “working class” – particularly on the basis of securing interests of neo-liberal capital against the common principles of the majority, a fair share to their economic birth-right.

The massive state of public awareness of this is one of the major reasons why the MDC-coalition will not win the 2018 elections – not withstanding its unpreparedness to kick start its campaign.

It is even irrational for one to assume that the handful which attended Chamisa’s rallies outside Harvest House is a sample of the election outcome.

What of the multitudes who thronged the National Sport Stadium for President Mnangagwa’s inauguration?

I am certain that a greater part of the Harvest House crowd was mainly people from Harare. Zimbabweans in Mutoko, Chipinge, Chivhu, Zvimba, Nkayi, Rusape, Chimanimani and Binga know Tsvangirai as a solicitor of infamous economic sanctions.

It is known that he took this route to gratify his ambitions to usurp power.

Indeed many attended his funeral, mourned with the MDC family on social media, but that does not mean that Zimbabweans have forgot the sanctions as a heinous route taken by Tsvangirai to assert his democratic right to be an opposition leader.

The characteristics of ambition and narcissism in his leadership approach is also substantiated by his firm hold to power even at a time his health was no longer permitting.

To this end, he is said to have appointed Nelson Chamisa to lead the MDC-Alliance, at the same time appointing Engineer Elias Mudzuru as the acting president of the party.

Wither democracy?

The starting point of this critical evaluation of the leadership crisis manifesting after Tsvangirai’s departure is the party’s contested succession.

When Tsvangirai left for South Africa, Eng Mudzuru was appointed as the party’s acting president by ailing Tsvangirai.

As Tsvangirai’s condition deteriorated, we are told Mudzuri was right there next to his boss thinking that he was the “anointed” one.

After the passing-on of Tsvangirai at the climax of the succession battle between him (Mudzuru) and Chamisa, Mudzuri was quick to raise the “loyalty card” as one who was with Tsvangirai to the end.

Tsvangirai’s family also backed Mudzuri as he temporarily became Tsvangirai’s death-bed correspondent.

On the other hand, Chamisa was winning the party’s structures to his favour before he could pronounce himself as the party’s acting president – and thus the smart ouster of Mudzuri.

In no time after Tsvangirai’s death, Chamisa’s acting presidency was endorsed by the party’s highest decision making council.

To this day, the legality of Chamisa’s role as acting president is still questioned.

It is now clear that Dr Thokozane Khuphe is Nelson Chamisa’s high potential factional wrestler if this matter is not resolved according to the MDC constitutionally premised prescription of succession.

Narcissism and the crisis of legitimacy

Narcissism has always defined the character of MDC and is the major cause for factionalism in the MDC-T.

Tsvangirai the “democrat”, as he is popularised, failed to create a smooth transition within the MDC-T.

Instead, he chose to call the shots from his death-bed.

Mudzuri was a dormant acting president and he drew his legitimacy from his proximity to Tsvangirai in his last days.

Thokozani Khuphe, on the other hand, was quick to publicise her direct involvement in repatriating Tsvangirai’s body home.

As one could intimately read into her communication, it was clear that this was her way of gaining relevance.

Her efforts were only edged on expedience and not any moral obligation to give dignity to her late boss.

However, young Chamisa’s determination to lead the party seems to have been drawn from a blessing he secretly got from the late Morgan Tsvangirai.

This has since been confirmed by Welshman Ncube who claims that Tsvangirai confided in him that he wanted Chamisa to lead the MDC-Alliance in the event that his health failed him.

On this account, one can conclude that the opposition’s clear objective has been to assume power even if it meant subjecting the nation to international sanctions.

In the same manner, Tsvangirai could not give up power even in the most chronic state of his health.

This proves that the MDC-T has survived under autocratic terms of power with Tsvangirai being the party’s unquestionable central figure of power.

This explains the current individualist centred terms of the leadership crisis in MDC-T which is a defining premise of the leadership style MDC inherited from Morgan Tsvangirai.

The forthcoming 2018 election

Chamisa has manipulated the party’s structures in favour of his personal interests.

As it is, the MDC-T still has no defined direction in articulating issues of national interests ahead of the 2018 polls.

After all, the “Mugabe Must Go” monologue has expired.

Moreover, if Chamisa makes it out of his current dilemma, he still has a bigger fight with Zanu-PF.

It is easy to take power away from a dying man but very tough to do so from a man who is a hero to many.

It is prudent at this time to ask; will MDC-T rise again if it falls now?

Richard Mahomva is an independent researcher and a literature aficionado interested in the architecture of governance in Africa and political theory. Feedback: rasmkhonto@gmail.com

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It is a very human foible to be comfortable in the familiar. We derive great comfort from having an “acceptable” way of doing things, following tradition and hiding behind convention.

For many, the unknown and new ways hold much fear, even as we like to brag about living in an age of innovation that gives us technological toys to occupy our time ever day.

People find solace in formulas and rigidity.

But the reality is that there is no formula to life. There is no rigid pathway to success. More particularly for us in Zimbabwe, there is no magic bullet that will suddenly develop our national economy and put food on every table, clothes on every back, and a roof over every head.

If anything, this marvellous age of innovation has told us that the old ways of doing things can have minimal or zero results.

Our Government, under the stewardship of President Emmerson Mnangagwa, has made it crystal clear that economic revival is its top priority.

While a clear path towards this revival is being charted, everyone involved – that is every Zimbabwean – needs to be innovative.

The nation needs to break away from tradition and venture into new territory if we are serious about taking this ship to our mutually desired destination of sustainable development for decent livelihoods.

Already, Zimbabwe’s economy, once the breadbasket of Southern Africa, has begun to show flickers of life after a decade of roaming in the wilderness. What the doctors will order at this critical juncture will determine the speed at which Zimbabwe fully recovers and forever leaves the intensive care unit.

It goes without saying that every progressive Zimbabwean desires a speedy recovery. With 70 percent of the country’s population relying on farming for their livelihoods, agriculture remains the backbone of the country’s economy.

This is a sector that is not only critical to food self-sufficiency, which in itself ends the need to spend money on imports, but also provides the bulk of raw materials for manufacturing, thus growing exports.

At a time the whole world is reeling from the effects of climate change and calling for more eco-friendly ways of farming that conserve water, vegetation and soil cover, there is need for innovation in agriculture on several fronts.

The old ways of approaching agriculture will no longer do. Which is why there is greater need for investment in both the financing and creativity that informs Command Agriculture.

Zimbabwe needs to put its time, money and energy in irrigation systems that effectively use water.

The country needs to occupy itself with rolling out a cost-effective mechanisation programme that allows smallholders – the backbone of national food security – to get more out of their land.

There is need for greater practical research in seed varieties and fertilisers so that we start producing what we need in this regard in sufficient quantities.

The change in our ways should also encompass things as simple but as vital as how we plant, with the State, through its extension services, placing greater emphasis on methods such as zero tillage.

In this context, we need Command Agriculture to become a holistic programme that looks at the entire value chain and introduces innovations that deliver quick wins for our economy.

The same applies to another key sector: mining.

Mining can provide the financial resources needed to invest in farm mechanisation, and with low hanging fruits like gold, there is no reason why our economy cannot be set right with minimal fuss.

For this to happen, an innovative production monitoring, taxation and royalties regime is needed so that both miners and the State benefit from the resources that are extracted here.

In addition, a recent report from the University of Zimbabwe suggests that Zimbabwe sits on about 60 minerals and metals, and 20 of these remain unexploited.

That’s money lying idle while the yawning deficit gap persists. Surely, our thinkers can unlock this unrealised value. With the whole world warming up to Zimbabwe following the change of Government in November 2017, serious opportunities abound in agriculture and mining.

As we have stated several times on this very page over the years, the best way for any Government to win votes is by delivering economic results to the electorate. Elections are a few months away and it is in the Government’s best interests to lure investment in mining and agriculture by thinking innovatively.

But it is not just about the politicians.

Our research institutions must step forward and fully take on the think tank role they are supposed to play.

In their spheres big and small, all Zimbabweans have a duty to come up with new ways of making this economy tick.

We cannot afford to hide behind the fig leaf of tradition and convention. Innovating is an existential imperative.

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COMRADE Gomba Midson Mupasu, born 6 March 1942, whose Chimurenga name was Cde Norman Bethune, has in the past given us narrations about the role that he played as they ferried homwe yaMbuya Nehanda from Tsokoto to Chifombo. He has given us a narration of the Chimoio massacre as he was the overall commander at the base at that time. Following these narrations, we have been inundated with requests from readers who want to really know more about this veteran freedom fighter.

This column belongs to the people and so below is Cde Bethune giving his long journey during the liberation struggle. Cde Bethune grew up in Chipuriro in Guruve South, but his family is originally from Buhera, kwaNyashanu. He says, one day he had a misunderstanding nemwana wemurungu and that incident changed his life forever.

In this interview with our team comprising Munyaradzi Huni and Tendai Manzvanzvike, Cde Bethune narrates how he was recruited to join the struggle in 1968 while waiting for a job opportunity at Lever Brothers, his journey to Francistown and to Lusaka. He talks about his training at Mgagao and gives revolutionary teachings from Chairman Mao’s little red book.

Read on …

SM: Cde Bethune, after your narrations about Mbuya Nehanda and the Chimoio massacre, people have been asking lots of questions about you. Tell us how you joined the liberation struggle?

Cde Bethune: I came to Salisbury in 1968 and I used to stay in Lusaka in Highfield. My idea was to look for a job. Ndakabva papurazi ndarova mwana wemurungu papurazi remurungu. I had finished my Standard Six. One day we had a slight misunderstanding, mwana wemurungu achibva andirova nembama. I looked at the little boy and clapped him back. He fell down. His face became red. I locked him in the office and went to the workers’ compound. I took my bags and left going to Salisbury. I knew that because I had clapped this white little boy, I was in serious trouble. This was a serious crime because murungu haaifanirwa kurohwa. You know kuti baba vangu inini vaibisira hat kamwana kemurungu? Now that I had beaten this little boy, I knew I was going to jail. I was later told that Rhodesian police looked for me for days. I stayed for days in Salisbury. One day I thought of looking for muzukuru wangu ainzi Wise. I had been told that anoshanda kuSalisbury. I later met with Wise. He is still alive. I stayed at his house for about three days. One day I got lucky and was taken to do a temporary job as a loader at Lever Brothers.

On another day, while waiting outside the gate at Lever Brothers, some guy who I think was in his 20s, came. I think his name was Philip. He was holding a newspaper and I asked him if I could read the paper just for a few minutes. When he gave me the newspaper, I discovered that inside the newspaper there was some folder. One of the papers inside this folder was boldly written: “Zanu Mwenje! Let’s rebuild Zimbabwe! We are our own liberators”

When Philip saw that I was reading this paper, he asked me kuti ngatisuduruke pane vanhu. Philip then said to me “do you know the stuff you are reading can get you arrested?” I didn’t know what he was talking about and I asked him why? I asked him kuti ndosungwa ini ndiri kuverenga sei iwe uri kufamba nazvo usiri kusungwa? I was in the dark. After this conversation, we went back to the Lever Brothers gate. The next day, Philip asked to talk to me on our own. He asked me whether I had understood what I had read the previous day. I asked him what he was talking about. He then explained to me what this was all about.

SM: What did he say?

Cde Bethune: He explained to me that this was about politics. He explained to me that Zanu was a political party. I didn’t know about Zanu because we grew up knowing about Zapu only. He then told me that if you are interested to hold a gun, you will be trained for six months in Zambia then come back to Rhodesia to fight whites. I couldn’t believe what he was saying so I probed him further and he explained things in detail. On the third day, I told Philip that I wanted to go for training. I later discovered that Philip was part of a network of people who were recruiting people to go for military training in Zambia. That is when I understood why everyday Philip was always holding his newspaper. This is how I got to know about Zanu Mwenje being led by Ndabaningi Sithole.

On that third day, I met Philip at Railways and he bought our tickets to Bulawayo. We went to Bulawayo. Around 7pm, we got into a bus which was going to Plumtree. I think this bus was called Pelandaba Bus Service. At 10pm we got to Plumtree at Dingimuzi terminus. All the way, Philip was looking after me very well.

SM: So you never said goodbye to your relatives in Salisbury?

Cde Bethune: I never told them anything and I never took anything to show I was going away. So when we got to Plumtree, we walked during that night and all I did was to follow Philip. I think around 2am, we had crossed the border, we rested for a while. We started walking again and just before dawn we got pane umwe musha. Philip went to one of the houses and knocked on the door. Some old man mupositori opened the door for us. This madzibaba was the Zanu contact person in the area. Philip handed me over to this madzibaba and he didn’t really tell me that he was going back. He just said, “chimbosara pano.” I remained behind. This madzibaba was fluent in both the Tswana, Ndebele and Shona language. I have to tell you that still by this time, I didn’t really know what I had gotten myself into. All I knew was that I wanted to go for training but wasn’t even aware of the dangers. I only got to know the full story when I got to Francistown.

Madzibaba later that day drove me to Francistown. I was handed over to the Zanu Mwenje representative Phibion Shonhiwa. I overhead Madzibaba telling Shonhiwa that “nhasi tangokwanisa kuuya nemukomana one.” Shonhiwa then sat down with me and for the first time I was called comrade. He explained to me what was going to happen. But before this, he vetted me asking lots of questions. He told me that the situation in Botswana at that time was too tense and so I was to remain at his house for a while. He told me that the Botswana government knew about his role at a Zanu representative. Shonhiwa gave me literature on politics written by people like CheGuavara, Lenin, Mao and so on.

After some days, Shonhiwa said the system was that I was supposed to be handed over to the Botswana police. He explained that this didn’t mean I was under arrest and he told me that he would be coming to see me everyday. Indeed, he took me to the police. He told me that once I got to the station, I was supposed to tell them that I wanted to go to school in Sierra Leone. He told me that this was being done because the Rhodesian Special Branch had planted its people in the Botswana police. I stayed at the police station for two days. On the third day, Shonhiwa came after processing some papers and took me back to his house. I stayed at his house from March until November. During these months, he gave me serious political orientation and by July, vakanga vava kutondinonokera. Two more recruits, Jairos Ruredzo and Peter Dandajena came while I was still staying with Shonhiwa.

In November, we flew to Livingstone in Zambia where we met Cde Felix Rice Santana and Cde Gava. They drove us to Lusaka in a Landrover. We were taken to House Number 93 kuKamwala. This is where I met Cde Mayor Urimbo, Cde Kurauwone, Cde Justin Chauke, Cde Chinamaropa, Cde Enerst Kadungure, Cde Kumbirai Kangai and others. Cde Tongogara would frequently pass through the house. I don’t even know where Peter Dandajena and Jairos Ruredzo were staying but we later met during training. After a few days, I was ordered to write my life history. This was later compared with information that had come from Shonhiwa. This is the way they checked to see if someone was really genuine.

SM: How long did you stay at Number 93?

Cde Bethune: The whole year. The whole of 1969 I was there. Again these comrades I mentioned above explained to me that I was now a comrade waiting to go for military training. They gave me political orientation. These comrades gave the foundation to understand the liberation struggle. I later went for military training, but these comrades had really turned me into a comrade ready to sacrifice for his country. They told me that I would go for military training in Tanzania. They told me tiri kumirira kuti mumbowanda. In January 1970, that is when we were taken to Tanzania for military training. We passed through Intumbi, Mbeya, Iringa going to Mgagao. At Mgagao we were handed over to some Chinese instructors.

SM: Cde Bethune, before we go to Mgagao, let’s talk briefly about the relationship between Zapu and Zanu in Lusaka. We hear at this time there were clashes between the two parties.

Cde Bethune: It’s true, relations between Zanu and Zapu at this time were bad. But personally I got to know about these bad relations after our training. When I was at Number 93, I was not allowed to go around a lot so I didn’t know much about what was happening. This was also for our security became the Rhodesians Special Branch had its people in Lusaka. When I was now a commander at Napundwa Base that’s when I got to know and see the clashes. I remember the Zanu and Zapu representatives sometimes would clash over recruits at the Zambian airport. Recruits had to quickly indicate the party they had come to join. But I know of incidences where recruits who had come thinking they were to join Zapu were kidnapped byZanu. Zapu also did the same.

SM: Who were your leaders at Mgagao?

Cde Bethune: There was Cde Cuthbert Chimedza, Cde Elias Hondo, Cde Mlambo and others. Cde Tongo, Cde Mupunzarima, Cde Fox Corner would come sometimes to see how our training was going. We were trained by Chinese instructors and one of our interpreters was Cde Enerst Kadungure. By the time we finished training, we were 45 comrades. Our group is the group that later made the world to recognise Zanu.

SM: Who are some of the comrades who were among this group of 45?

Cde Bethune: I can’t remember all the comrades but there was Cde Kenneth Gwindingwi, Abel Sibanda, Josiah Ziso, Mugwagwa, Josiah Tungamirai, Dick Moyo who later died after being kidnapped in Botswana. He was the Zanu representative by that time in 1972. He was beheaded by the enemies. Nyaya yaDick Moyo up to this day inondirwadza zvikuru (long pause). He was educated but akanga azvipira to fight for his country. Other comrades I received military training with include Cde Tumai, Gordon Shiri, Cephas Tichatonga, Timothy Shangara, Mike who on deployment, crossed and joined the Rhodesian forces. Our training including how to use different guns – AK 47, semi-automatic rifle, Light Machine Gun, rocket launcher (bazooka, RPG 7 and RPG 2), 60 mm motor bomb, 81 mm and 82 mm motor bombs. We were also taught first aid, we were taught politics – how the country was colonised and the situation in Rhodesia. We were taught how the colonialists had brainwashed us so that we abandon our customs and traditions. The Chinese instructors always told us that “you as Zimbabweans, the biggest weapon to fight a war is to understand what the colonisers have done to your country.” They told us that without an identity, you are not a human being. Wakabviswa pahunhu hwako. The instructors spoke about our history as if they once stayed in Rhodesia. These Chinese instructors were part of the Chinese Revolution. The hardships they went through during their war, they taught us how to overcome them. They taught us war tactics and they taught us how to read the mind of the enemy. They would always tell us that “you should know you are fighting for your identity. Zimbabwe is for black people, it’s not for white people.” They would tell us that whites were colonisers and it was important to understand why they came to colonise us. Vakachiva zvakapihwa Zimbabwe naMwari. That’s why varungu vakauya kuzotipidigura pfungwa kuti tifunge kuti vakanaka.

We were also trained to lead others as commanders. They were looking ahead because they wanted us to be instructors in future. We used to read this little red book entitled; “Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse Tung.” This book covers vast areas including zvakaitika and zvichaitika. I still have this book after I got it at Mgagao. It really opens one’s mind. Let me read you two sentences from the chapter entitled The Mass Line (reading) ‘The people and the people alone are the motive force in the making of world history.” The people of Zimbabwe are the one who build their country’s history. Let me continue reading ‘The masses are the real heroes while we ourselves are often childish and ignorant. Without this understanding, it is impossible to acquire even the most rudimental knowledge.” (smiling) Unotovhurika pfungwa chete. This book rakandidzamira up to this day. This is my Bible. You know in this book, Chairman Mao told us that vanotamburira kurwira nyika will not enjoy the fruits of that country. We knew this a long time ago. So my generation we understood what this book said and we applied this during the years at the war front during the early years of the struggle around 1972 and 1973. We were operating in Mash Central at that time. We would not just come to the area totanga kuridza pfuti. Taitanga tataura nevanhu. We would explain to the masses what the war was all about and we told them kuti war means some people will die. Ini ndichafa, ivo vachafa but they should understand the cause.

SM: How difficult was the training?

Cde Bethune: I remember Cde Gabarinocheka took a long time to master how to use the gun. Aitya. We would poke fun at him saying, ukasangwara you will be captured. Hindava kubva watya zvakadaro? Saka kuno wakavingei? We would ask him kutiko inferiority complex yakadai yakabvepi? For some of us, we were saying “varungu vachationa.”

During training we were even taught to endure torture after being captured. You know our generation we were taught kuti comrade haanzi afa during a battle. When a fellow comrade was killed during a battle, we would never say “comrade afa.” We would say “comrade akuvara, or comrade asara.”

When a comrade was wounded, we would only say “comrade akuvara.” Speaking openly kuti comrade wafa, zvaiita sekuchichidzira mamwe macomrades. Such language would create fear and we would avoid it. As comrades we understood what we were talking about. During our time, varungu vaiti kana vauraya comrade, they would take his body. They were looking for popular comrades such as Kid Marong’orong’o and James Bond 007. Varungu vaida kuona kuti ndiye here munhu anga achitinetsa uyu and they would also show povo the dead person. The Rhodesians were cruel even to a dead body. Vaisungira a dead body pahelicopter and fly over villagers for people to see vachitaura a lot of bad things to instil fear into the masses. But then hondo haina kumira.

The way they were treating our dead comrades zvaitotipa chivindi to go after them. Their efforts to instil fear into the masses failed because of the political orientation we had given the masses. Later they resorted to protected villages, they called them maKeep, but still taipinda into those Keeps and the masses vaitipa chikafu tichidya.

SM: During training you were taught guerilla warfare. Why guerilla warfare?

Cde Bethune: The instructors chose guerilla warfare because it’s difficult to contain. We were trained to fight in small groups of seven comrades. They used to call it sparrow warfare. You know kashiri kaya kanonzi kanyenganyenga? That bird is difficult to catch because of the way it flies. They also taught us about urban warfare, kupinda mumaguta hiding my AK 47 in my big jacket. Haikona zvatava kuona mazuvano munhu anozviti ndewe intelligence achifamba showing off pfuti. Hakuna intelligence dzakadaro. Intelligence is about disguise. Iva munhu wekuti unokwanisa kupinda kana papi. Especially vakadzi can be deadly.

You know after our training, we were given money kuti chimboendai mutown. They wanted to see kuti can we mix and mingle with the people in such a way that we would not be noticed as outsiders. We were supposed to dress in a way that made us look like ordinary villagers. A good example is Comrade Kenny Ridzai. He stayed pane umwe musha for a long time trying to find a way to escape the Rhodesian soldiers. He fitted perfectly into the family that he was staying with. Varungu vakamusiya vachitofunga kuti kamwana kepamusha ipapo, yet he was a well-trained freedom fighter. We were taught all that. By giving us money, they also wanted to see kuti kana taita mari how do we behave and when drunk how do you behave. Uchazvibatisa here or what? Our group was taught all that. This didn’t happen kune vakazouya kumashure, the ones we later trained. Even my understanding of the war was totally different from the comrades who joined the struggle later. The comrades who came later havana kuzowana dzamiso. Havana kubikika zvakanaka. Time yakanga yava kuita pfupi.

We were taught kuti ukasvika pane vanhu, you should know those people’s tradition and culture. When you know that, make sure you fit in.

The Chinese instructors had encountered this during their war. We were also blessed when we went to the war front because Mbuya Nehanda and other masvikiro aititungamira. They would warn us of impending danger. Some of us we saw this happening. It’s not like we were told. For example, the first female comrades who went for military training stopped going for their monthly periods. Havaifanirwa kuyeresa zvombo. Chombo chainzi hachifanirwi kubatwa nemukadzi anogeza. That’s why vakamiswa kugeza.

There is also a bird called hungwe or chapungu. Shiri mbiri idzi dzine zvadzaitaura kwatiri. Chapungu chaitidzidzisa kuti kana muchifamba, chikachema chichiuya kwamuri, chichiita sechirikuda kukumharai mumusoro, hapatori nguva before an attack. This was a sign that you have entered enemy territory. Asi ukaona chapungu chichi tenderera chiri kumusoro, the direction it goes ndiko kuri kuenda varungu. Chikatenderera at one place, its telling you kuti varungu vakamira. All that Mao Tse Tung aizvitaura in his theories in this little red book. We had been told by Mao through his teachings that we were supposed to follow our culture in fighting the war. We were told kuti munoziva here kuti muri vanhu vatema and tsika dzenyu munodziziva here?

SM: Can you shed more light on this issue where you said the first female comrades stopped going for their monthly periods?

Cde Bethune: We had been told about it naMbuya Nehanda. Like I told you we took Mbuya Nehanda from Tsokoto to Chifombo before we started fighting the war. So she conducted some ritual with these female comrades. It was during that ritual that she told us that imi sevarwi kuti hondo ikasire kupera, hamufanirwi kusangana nevakadzi.

Hamufanirwi kudya chikafu chinobikwa nevakadzi vachiri kugeza. Munofanirwa kudya chikafu chinobikwa nevakwegura. Mbuya Nehanda also told us that hondo yedu was not supposed to take many years. She then said mukurwa kwamuchaita munhu wese mutema achava nekutambura.

Vakapedzisira nekuti gonzo nenzungu hazvingagarisane. Gonzo haringaregi kuruma nzungu. In simple terms, she was talking about varume nevakadzi during the war. She said kurumwa kwenzungu negonzo ndiko kuchaita hondo yenyu irebe. She told us that because female comrades were going to have the task to ferry war materials from Chifombo to Zambezi, they were going to stop going for their monthly periods.

Next week, Cde Bethune will narrate how they were deployed to the war front as the famous Group of 45 and the battles he fought. It’s a reverting read.

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Clemence Machadu 
An ideal leader for a country such as ours must guarantee the country’s democracy and freedom which was restored to Zimbabweans after many gallant sons and daughters had struggled for years with others ultimately paying for it with their blood.

Howdy folks!

The election season is upon us and it is that time of the half-decade when Zimbabweans get to give fresh mandates to leaders of their choice.

And certainly, all eyes will be glued on the country to see how we are going to pull it through.

Folks, an electoral system based on universal suffrage; free, fair and regular elections; as well as equality of votes are some of the essential principles of good governance which bind the State and all institutions or agencies of the Government of Zimbabwe.

A reading of Section 67 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe shows that every citizen has the right to free, fair and regular elections for any elective public office and to make political choices freely.

But for one to enjoy this right, they have to be registered to vote. Did you register to vote folks, or you want others to choose the leaders on your behalf?

But maybe the words of Plato might give the matter a better dimension.

The Greek philosopher is on record saying, “One of the penalties of refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”

You see, participating in the elections by voting therefore gives you the power to decide how Zimbabwe should be run.

If you have concerns about the way you want Zimbabwe to be governed, voting gives you the opportunity to make a contribution towards realising that goal.

You cannot afford to be on the side-lines.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission has made reasonable progress towards ensuring that the elections are a resounding success and has already stated that polls should be conducted between 21 July and 21 August, with results expected within five days as provided for in the Electoral Act.

It is also interesting to note that over 5,3 million people have so far registered, although registration is still ongoing.

This number has already surpassed the 3,4 million registered voters we had in the 2013 elections.

This obviously shows that citizens of this great nation are increasingly developing interest in participating in processes to shape their future.

But nearly two million people who are eligible to vote are yet to come out and register, given that Zimbabwe has a projected voter population of at least 7,2 million.

However since voter registration is not compulsory under the country’s law, we might not get to that number.

It also appears that he or she who wins the hearts of women in this watershed election will automatically become president.

Women constitute 54.5 percent of the electorate with the remaining 45,5 percent being males. What this hypothetically means is that if all women were to vote for a particular candidate, he or she will win the top job of becoming the most powerful person in Zimbabwe.

On the other hand, if all men were to vote for a particular candidate, he or she will unfortunately lose the election, having failed to attain the 50 percent plus one vote.

Winning the hearts of women is therefore crucial in this election.

Other interesting dynamics in this election are that those aged between 18 and 34 constitute 43,5 percent of the voter population.

These are basically the youth as defined by the constitution, which says people between the ages of 15 and 35 are youths.

However those under 18 cannot be included as they are not eligible voters.

In my view, this age group could be bigger but many of them are probably part of the 1 913 395 eligible voters who have not yet registered to vote.

Some young people who are eligible to vote might be in school and with no proper information on the process.

According to Zec, the 35-59 age group constitutes 42,9 percent of the electorate with the remaining 13,6 percent composed of those aged 60 years and above.

Folks, the most critical question in an election is who to vote for and why.

This is a very important decision that requires time to make.

You really cannot decide on it the minute you step into the voting booth. You should give yourself time to review the candidates, their political parties and manifestos, and it is a process that starts now.

Folks, in choosing a presidential candidate one has to consider whether the person has good leadership qualities to enable them to lead the country towards political and socio-economic development.

It is also important to consider the policies of that candidate’s party in key sectors of the economy such as agriculture, mining and industry as well as their plans for the economy at large.

Folks, you don’t vote for someone just because they are young or old.

Some might be young on the outside, but behave like 94-year-olds. Some might be old but have young spirits. So age on its own is really nothing but a number. What is really important is someone’s capacity and ability to deliver effectively.

Folks, you should be able to justify your vote.

For instance, will your preferred candidate be able to provide hospitals, clinics, schools and other infrastructure to enhance the living conditions of Zimbabweans?

Zimbabweans need a presidential candidate who will ensure the creation of more jobs for the youth as well to enable them to contribute meaningfully to national development.

Also ask yourself whether the political party of that candidate has the capacity to accelerate the country’s socio-economic development.

However, if it a party that is always bickering, marred with infighting and gross confusion, what gives you zvivindi zvekuvavhotera?

Can they be trusted to run the whole country, if they fail to run their parties or respect their own rules they have set for themselves?

Will they be able to respect the rules set by the entire people of Zimbabwe as a collective?

Folks, it is important to vote for parties that fully realise and are consciously alive to the important fact that the agenda of the people of Zimbabwe is far much bigger than their personal or parties’ agendas.

Voters should be scared of people who choose resort to violence all the time, whether they are at funerals or having their own meetings.

An ideal leader for a country such as ours must guarantee the country’s democracy and freedom which was restored to Zimbabweans after many gallant sons and daughters had struggled for years with others ultimately paying for it with their blood.

Someone who has been tried and tested and has the ability to take Zimbabwe to the next level.

But at the end of the day, your vote is your right.

Vote for what you think is the best for you and for someone you really believe in.

If it happens that you do not really support anyone on the ballot, at least vote for someone you think might a difference.

At the end of the day all we want is progress.

What is therefore important to keep at the back of the mind is that misplaced votes can deter the wheels of development, and result in worsening socioeconomic ills.

Therefore don’t make the grave mistake of having a clueless person placed into Government. Choose someone who is able to deal with the economic, social and political problems and move the country in the right direction.

My steeds await, let me ride back to the country.

Later folks!

Clemence Machadu is an economist, researcher and consultant. He writes for The Sunday Mail in his personal capacity

907 total views, 56 views today

Mr John Swanepoel
As the chief executive of South African company Rostrum Trading Platform, I have been smitten by the Zimbabwe Government policies since the coming in of President Emmerson Mnangagwa.

My company is keen to invest in a number of projects here, hence our coming for the Mining Investment Conference (in Harare last week).

We focus on the development of mines from brownfields through to beneficiation.

Our business has mainly been in South Africa with our mineral interests in North West province where we have been involved in the mining and full beneficiation of chrome over the past 15 years. We have also been involved in manganese, chrome ore, gold and iron ore.

In Zimbabwe, we are looking at investing in the areas of chrome, lithium, limestone and gold. There are huge opportunities in these sectors and we would like to play our part in investing in Zimbabwe.

I am so excited to be in Zimbabwe and I can proudly say that Zimbabwe is now the New Africa.

My hope is that in the coming years, your country can be Africa’s Dubai in terms of attracting the global capital.

As a businessman, you have at times to work with your natural instinct.

My natural instinct right now tells me that I have to invest money in Zimbabwe. There is a feel-good vibe about Zimbabwe right now and it has definitely caught up with me.

I want to applaud Government for doing the right things and sending the right messages that the country is open for business.

I first caught this feel-good vibe last year, soon after the new dispensation came in.

All eyes were on Zimbabwe and coming from just across the border in South Africa, I could not help but take interest.

It was clear that Zimbabwe was ready for change.

This meant that Government also had to do certain things to bring businesspeople to the country.

When I saw your President at Davos, I was impressed by his message and the sincerity of his statements.

I liked the pace at which he instituted changes, such as the immediate repealing of the indigenisation laws and the ease of business reforms.

It was clear that the new Government knows the potential of Zimbabwe and they have taken the initiative to release that potential to the rest of the world.

I have also been impressed by the welcome from the Zimbabwe Investment Authority.

It has been easy to measure the success that your Government has achieved because you started from zero, and to date so much investment commitments have been made.

When Vice-President Chiwenga made his speech at the Mining Investment Conference, you could tell that this is a man who means business and who is clear in what he wants for the country.

I was happy that he carried the same message that President Mnangagwa has been carrying.

This consistency is what we need as business and it is different from the past when we use to hear different messages coming from the Zimbabwean Government officials.

My humble opinion, after having been coming in and out of Zimbabwe in the past three months, is that there is no country in Africa at the moment which has a better environment for investors.

Our company now has a plan to raise capital from markets such as the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, the London Stock Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Our initial investment that we have made available to kick-start so far is to the tune of about US$3 million. But this is just the start and with time we are hoping to invest more.

Our vision is to raise up to US$1 billion from these markets, if we are afforded the opportunities which are worth that amount.

The US$3 million that I have spoken about is ready and we have already set a management team that is in place. They are doing the groundwork.

Our strategy is to start our investment in exploration then we will go to the next level based on the feasibility studies.

I was able to set up a company here in quick time and I am very impressed, particularly with the gold sector.

We have signed up a number of chrome claims, but these are just a start and we are going to be doing more. You are definitely going to hear more about this company.

According to what I have seen, Zimbabwe can get to up to 100 tonnes of gold (per year), because your country has the resource.

I am willing to share my positive experiences in Zimbabwe and advise any other investors out there that indeed Zimbabwe is open for business.

Our business is already up and running in Zimbabwe and I have every confidence that we will do well.

I know that the challenge has been on how to get our money out of the country as investors, but the authorities have given us their assurances on this and I have taken their word.

God bless Zimbabwe

Mr John Swanepoel is president and CEO of Rostrum Trading Platform. He spoke to The Sunday Mail’s Chief Reporter Kuda Bwititi at the Mining Investment Conference in Harare last week

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The debate on what happens next in South Africa has gripped the region, and the wider international community as well as businesses and investors.

In December 2017, South Africa’s ruling ANC said it was in support of expropriation of land for redistribution from white farmers to the black majority without compensation. That resolution by the ANC has now been followed up with a February 27, 2018 overwhelming vote by that country’s Parliament to begin a process that could amend the constitution to allow for expropriation of without compensation.

In a blog post on the Council on Foreign Relations website after that parliamentary vote, writer John Campbell contextualised the need for land reforms thus: “In 2015, more than 55 percent of South Africans were poor.

“According to Statistics South Africa, less than one percent of the total white population was poor, while 63 percent of black people, 37 percent of coloured people, and seven percent of Indian/Asian people were poor.

“The nine percent of South Africa’s population that is white holds the lion’s share of the country’s wealth. Most blacks see their poverty as the direct consequence of apartheid.

“While it is true that since the transition to non-racial democracy the small black middle class has grown and a few oligarchs have emerged, wealth inequality among blacks is now much greater than that between whites and blacks.”

The debate on what happens next in South Africa has gripped the region, and the wider international community as well as businesses and investors.

Pieter du Toit, the Editor-in-Chief of Huffington Post South Africa has set out to clarify what has happened in South Africa, and what will likely happen next regarding this very emotive issue.

***

Pieter du Toit

The (South African) National Assembly passed a motion by 241 votes to 83 mandating an investigation into a possible constitutional amendment.

Did it not vote to agree to change section 25, the so-called “property clause”? No, it did not. It merely agreed to a process to look at possible changes to the Constitution.

Who will investigate this?

The Constitutional Review Committee. It is a parliamentary committee that meets regularly to consider possible amendments to the country’s founding document. The committee often receives, and dismisses, some crazy ideas from the public.

Is it not calamitous to even consider changing the constitution, never mind changing it?

No, the constitution has been changed 18 times since its adoption in 1996. It is a document subject to regular review, although changes aren’t considered lightly.

How will the process work?

The committee will embark on a process of public consultation where ordinary South Africans can make submissions.

It will also be an opportunity for various interest groups, like AgriSA or Abahlali baseMjondolo, to state their case.

How will the committee then decide what to do?

The committee will consider public representations and then discuss whether or not the clause needs to be changed. If they agree it must, then they will debate what the actual wording of an alternate clause should be.

Who serves on the committee?

The committee is a multiparty body with representation from all parties. There are some ANC heavyweights serving on it, including Mathole Motshekga and Vincent Smith, while the opposition has Glynnis Breytenbach (Democratic Alliance), James Selfe (DA) and Steve Swart (ACDP). Floyd Shivambu is the Economic Freedom Front’s sole representative. The ANC has a majority.

How long will it take?

The National Assembly asked the committee to report back to it by August 30, 2018. It is an extremely tight deadline to consider an issue of this magnitude.

There will be a series of public hearings followed by committee meetings to agree on a recommendation to the National Assembly.

Will the National Assembly then decide to vote on the constitutional amendment?

It depends on whether the committee agrees that an amendment is needed, and if so, what that amendment should entail.

What is needed to change section 25?

A two-thirds majority, or 266 votes out of 400 in the National Assembly, plus one. The ANC has 249 seats and the EFF has 25.

Will the constitution be amended?

It could. If the constitutional review committee decides it should and agrees on a proposed amendment and if the National Assembly agrees, it will. If the committee rejects any amendment there will be no vote by MPs, but merely a report tabled. – Huffington Post

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Cleophas Pedzisa
The conduct of some public officials at our parastatals and State enterprises is no different from that of the Townsend farmer who through greed connived with his wife to kill the hen that laid golden eggs.
In his inaugural speech and in many other subsequent deliveries, President Emmerson Mnangagwa refers to the voice of the people as the voice of God: vox populi, vox Dei.

If developments in State enterprises and local authorities are anything to go by, then they are drowning the voice of God.

The rot, malfeasance, nepotism and undoable conduct reported in the Auditor-General’s reports make for sad reading. The 2016 financial audits of public companies show that 38 out of 93 parastatals incurred a combined U$270 million loss, mainly due to weak corporate governance and poor resource control mechanisms.

Parliament, in a bid to forestall and firewall such losses or malpractices has evolved the committees system. This is meant to provide systemic oversight.

Committees, the world over, play the crucial role of tracking the work of government departments, ministries and agencies.

They conduct specific investigations into particularly salient aspects of their policy and administration.

This is why, we have “kugeda-geda kwemeno” (gnashing of teeth) in most of these entities as they are called to account in Parliament.

The methods of these oral evidence gathering meetings though, are not in purview of this piece.

Kudos to the Public Accounts Committee which has always upped its stake in carrying out its oversight on the goings on in our State entities.

The committee, which is post-hoc, monitors Government expenditure and is chaired by a member from a non-governing party to enhance its independence.

Broadly speaking, its monitoring compass is ensconced in the following questions:

l Has public money been spent on purposes for which it was assigned?

l Has it been spent efficiently, without waste?

l Has spending been kept within the budget allocation? and

l Is there evidence of fraud or misappropriation or other irregularities?

For some parastatals, if not all, the answers to the above will be, no, no, no and on the last part, yes.

The reports by Auditor-General Ms Mildred Chiri, which are public records, make sad reading as, in some cases, financial records are not even availed for inspection, (Arda’s Sanyati and Katiyo estates).

In certain instances, payments are done for non-existent works.

Corporate governance principles and practices are thrown out the window whilst falsification of figures takes centre stage.

It is heartening to note that the office of the Auditor-General is doing tracking the operations of at public institutions.

In her report to Parliament in 2017, Ms Chiri noted that, “Whilst there has been a general improvement in the area of corporate governance in the public sector, some extreme cases of weak corporate governance were noted. . .The weaknesses emanate from (poor) revenue collection methods and weak systems in the procurement processes.”

In this new governance era, tendencies which gravitate towards bleeding the economy should be nipped in the bud.

There is evidence of graft, bribery, embezzlement, and underhand deals that have no role to play if our economy is to grow the way we want it to grow.

The conduct of some public officials at our parastatals and State enterprises is no different from that of the Townsend farmer who through greed connived with his wife to kill the hen that laid golden eggs.

In their wisdom, or rather lack of it, they suppose the hen must contain a great lump of gold inside it and it would be good to get to it.

We, the people of God, are victims of the gluttonous behaviour of management of state enterprises.

This should not be allowed to continue.

All is not lost though. The restocking and retooling of National Railways of Zimbabwe is a welcome development.

The NRZ took delivery of a consignment of wagons early this month which is heartening. An efficient rail system can work miracles for our economy.

Even our students soon will have the comfort of travelling by rail on their way to and from school, and not in the sugar daddy-given ex-japs clogging our roads.

The Cold Storage Company is expected to be stunning, bleeding, de-hiding, cutting and de-boning animals in this first quarter of this year under a collaborative effort with NSSA.

Now that Europe is warming to us, we should soon be able to once again export our tasty beef to those markets.

Life should become much better for  thousands of people through renewed operations at Ziscosteel, and Kamativi and Shabanie mines.

In all State enterprises, accountability and transparency should be the order of the day.

Those granted with the custodianship of State enterprises should be equal to measure and know that the “resources of the people are the resources of God”.

We need accountable, transparent and wise administration.

We cannot let people go scot free for choking the voice of God.

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To attend are executives from the Exim Bank of India, the Development Bank of Southern Africa and other financial institutions whose balance sheets have capacity to finance most of the big infrastructure projects in Zimbabwe.
DBSA is behind financing the rehabilitation of the Plumtree-Mutare highway for US$206 million through Infralink, an investment vehicle partnering ZINARA.

When Zimbabwe emerged from colonialism in 1980, the new Government faced a daunting task of rebuilding a nation devastated by over a decade of war.

Rebuilding the nation required astute leadership and frank conversations with those with the means of production.

For the new Government, there was need to guarantee existing investors that their investments were safe while potential investors had to be persuaded to pour their money into the country.

There was a general aversion to the “socialist” administration and the chilling spectre of possible compulsory acquisition of white owned assets as had been the case in some newly independent African nations.

Many were unsure of the economic trajectory the new Government would take and it was the duty of the new office holders to show leadership and give direction.

As a result, a good number of investment conferences were organised not only to explain the new trajectory the country was taking, but also to market the new nation as a destination of choice for investors.

Fast forward 37 years later, Zimbabwe finds itself in an almost similar situation.

The country is emerging from years of under investment characterised by collapsed infrastructure, a comatose industrial base and semi-collapsed social service infrastructure, among a plethora of other challenges.

The new political dispensation, which ushered in President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s Government late last year, is faced with more or less similar challenges to the ones faced by the first Zimbabwean Government.

While the administration has hit the ground running, going all out to promote the country’s potential as a first-rate investment destination, more still needs to be done.

President Mnangagwa has been at the forefront of an aggressive campaign to send the message that Zimbabwe is open for Business. As highlighted by his attendance at the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, it was reported that he was star attraction as he reiterated that message loud and clear.

Both locally and on the international scene, senior Government officials are headlining investment conferences, where they are selling the open for business mantra.

Only last week, Mines and Mining Development Minister Winston Chitando hosted the who’s who of the global mining industry during the Mining Investment Conference at a Harare hotel.

The extractive industry is expected to be central in mastering economic revival owing to the vast riches under Zimbabwean earth.

Meanwhile in Sandton, South Africa, Deputy Finance Minister Terrence Mukupe was appearing at the Financial Market Indaba while his boss Patrick Chinamasa was on a whirlwind tour across Europe, meeting senior European bureaucrats, including the British Foreign Affairs chief, Boris Johnson.

During this short period and through these investment forums, President Mnangagwa has launched a comprehensive investment handbook while investment pledges valued at more than US$3 billion have been extended.

This week, one of the biggest investment conferences in the country since independence will take place in Harare.

The Zimbabwe Investment Conference convenes on Tuesday in Harare under the theme “Zimbabwe, Towards a proffered Investment Destination”.

The conference is being organised by Oxlink Capita and coordinated by the Office of the President and Cabinet.

Government will have a high powered representation at the conference with six Ministries involved at the highest level.

Ministers Ambassador Simon Khaya Moyo (Energy and Power Development), Supa Mandiwanzira (ICT and Cybercrime), July Moyo (Local Government and national Housing), Mukupe (Deputy Finance and Economic Development), will be complimented by secretary for Tourism and hospitality Dr Thoko Chitepo and Transport and Infrastructure Development secretary Eng George Mlilo.

Organisers of the conference told The Sunday Mail that the respective Ministers are expected to outline the various opportunities available as well as incentives that are being offered under their portfolios to investors.

Discussions will centre on investment opportunities in infrastructure projects across a wide spectrum that includes ICT, energy, water and sanitation, among others.

Also to attend are executives from the Exim Bank of India, the Development Bank of Southern Africa and other financial institutions whose balance sheets have capacity to finance most of the big infrastructure projects in Zimbabwe.

DBSA is behind financing the rehabilitation of the Plumtree-Mutare highway for US$206 million through Infralink, an investment vehicle partnering ZINARA.

With bilateral trade between India and Africa rising to US$75 billion in 2015 and the India EximBank at the centre of facilitating lines of credit for a number of African countries, the importance of the presence of officials from the bank cannot be underscored.

The private sector will also be involved.

The Industry and Commerce Minister, whose ministry is in charge of investment promotion portfolio, told The Sunday Mail that investment conferences such as this one will form the foundation for actual investment into the country.

“I foresee a number of conferences being held in this country as well as abroad,” said Dr Bimha.

“I foresee quite a lot of work in that area because there is a lot of interest with the new dispensation.

“Judging by the number of inquiries we are getting, I see a very bright future for Zimbabwe.

“The President has pronounced reforms that give comfort to the private sector because his first call was that we must grow the economy and that Zimbabwe is open for business.

“That has resulted in a number of inquiries under a short space of time.

“So, we will participate in these events and continue preaching the President’s message”

Zimbabwe Investment Authority chief executive Mr Richard Mbaiwa said potential investors will be looking closely at these conferences in order to scout for investment opportunities.

He said authorities will take advantage and properly articulate the reforms being undertaken to improve the investment environment

“Generally, this is a window of opportunity and serious investors should ride on this wave,” said Mr Mbaiwa.

“Over the last two days, we have had the Mining Investment Conference and we also had a very powerful Germany delegation around.

“We had a delegation from the Germany Business Society on Tuesday and Wednesday and they were looking for opportunities in various areas, including infrastructure, energy, manufacturing and mining.

“The Germany Business Society is a very powerful institution that gives direction to where German money is invested.

“What we are saying is there are many opportunities and there are also serious reforms taking place.

“When we attend these conferences we are telling them that this is an opportune time and there is nothing to wait for.

“Even with elections around the corner there is nothing to wait for because there is a functioning system right now.

“Opportunities are not going to wait for anyone because the early bird catches the worm. We are giving them assurances that their investments are secure and we are reforming as we go.”

Economic analyst Mr Brains Muchemwa said continuous engagement between Government and the investor community will result in a win-win situation.

“Zimbabwe still offers significant discounted opportunities in most sectors of the economy when compared to most mature markets.

“Notwithstanding the abundance of opportunities, policy makers need to attract the right kind of investments that create decent jobs and improve the current account balance.

“And in order to attract such kinds of sustainable long term investments, there is need for continuous engagement with the investment community as well policy consistency.”

“In order to industrialise this economy and gravitate towards being a middle income economy by 2030 as outlined by the President, Zimbabwe needs a strong infrastructure base in order to capitalise on both its competitive and comparative advantages.”

It is clear that Zimbabwe is moving in the right direction and with renewed interests from investors, the country stares a brighter future.

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We publish opening remarks by the Commissioner General of Police Tandabantu Godwin Matanga at a meeting between Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Minister Obert Mpofu and senior police officers last week.

Honourable Minister Sir, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to you for being present with us here today.

Only recently, you were with us at the official opening of the new CID Headquarters and Forensic Science Laboratory.

I am quite confident that we are taking a leaf from your readiness to be with us in our greatest time of need.

Such exemplary conduct should inspire us to do the same to our subordinates at the various stations of their deployment. We sincerely thank you Honourable Minister for that.

This meeting is critical for the generation of ideas which should impact on the lives of the people of Zimbabwe, our visitors, their safety, security and the security of their property.

This is the second meeting with you Honourable Minister inside two months. In my view, this clearly attests to the extent for your deep-seated commitment and desire to see the Zimbabwe Republic Police churning out the best possible policing services to the people of Zimbabwe.

Undoubtedly, there are numerous operational dividends that accrue from platforms of this magnitude.

Biblically they say, ‘‘It is good and pleasant for brethren to dwell together in unity.” We, thus, Honourable Minster, truly cherish having you with us today and also as our Minister.

Honourable Minister following the directive you gave to all departments under your portfolio, we undertook to make the police more visible on the ground.

The aim is to reassure the public on their safety and remove the fear of crime.

In order to make good this promise, the Zimbabwe Republic Police has identified a number of sections that tend to unnecessarily duplicate work or whose continued existence may no longer be necessary.

Consequently, some stations are being downsized to make them more viable while other functions will be merged.

The recent massive transfers from Depot are examples designed to fulfil this desire. Honourable Minster, very soon, we shall be launching the Zimbabwe Republic Police patrol unit in Harare Central and Chitungwiza Districts.

The purpose of the patrol unit is to ensure that there are police officers deployed round the clock on crime prevention duties.

The patrol unit will be rolled out to all urban areas and cities.

In addition, Honourable Minister, the organisation shall be launching traffic de-congestion teams at all the major intersections starting with Harare.

We are currently in the process of training traffic officers who will control traffic movements at identified traffic intersections and they will use whistles together with “smart” hand-signals for the purpose.

These measures will be attained within the first 100-day period.

We are also taking steps to reconfigure our cycle unit so that it is deployed in residential areas such as Waterfalls, Marimba, Glen Norah, among others.

It is hoped that the cycle unit will operate more effectively in areas where there are reduced volumes of vehicular traffic.

Again, the idea is to improve police visibility and crime prevention.

The ZRP shall, as an on-going initiative, analyse current establishments within its structure to identify redundant stations and sections or those whose functions are operationally duplicative of others.

All these initiatives will in due course be replicated in other provinces.

And, resources permitting, the cycle unit shall also cover the industrial areas.

Our desire is to ensure prompt attendance of crime scenes and deterrence of criminals from committing crime.

Indeed, we remain seized with our role in the socio-economic development of our beloved nation.

Another area that will be given immediate attention is that of improving communication with the populace.

In this regard, the organisation will relocate its call centre from Chikurubi to Police General Headquarters for control purposes.

The call centre will be enhanced and restructured to ensure that concerns from the public get responsible attention.

I am also confident that we should be able to achieve this within the first 100-day period.

While resource constraints remain a challenge, Honourable Minister Sir, vakuru vakati kusatenda huroyi. We have witnessed first-hand how you speedily procured furniture for the new CID Headquarters.

We really thank you for the support, Honourable Minister.

Given the limited fiscal space obtaining in the country, this was no easy achievement.

Honourable Minister Sir, as an organisation, we will come up with a battery of initiatives to improve service delivery and supervision.

To this end, meaningful performance shall determine officers’ placement and promotion.

Honourable Minister Sir, we are currently giving new impetus to the anti-corruption strategies in place to rid the ZRP of corrupt police officers.

On the other hand, Honourable Minister Sir, we are dismayed that politically motivated violence is rearing its ugly head in some parts of the country.

This is despite repeated calls by His Excellency, the President of Zimbabwe Cde E.D Mnangagwa, for zero tolerance to political violence and promises of peaceful, free, fair, and credible elections.

We are equally mindful of the negative effect of violence on the credibility of the forthcoming national plebiscite.

To this end, the Zimbabwe Republic Police shall heighten intelligence-led policing mechanisms as well as police visibility in order to ensure that the atmosphere before, during and after elections remains peaceful and violence free.

Above all, we shall remain steadfast in bringing all perpetrators of violence to book by enforcing the law as it is, and without fear or favour.

Honourable Minister Sir, at times, the success of our police operations is impeded by political interference.

However, with your able guidance, we are confident that our presence shall be felt. What we promise is that we shall always seek to deliver.

Before I conclude, allow me Honourable Minister, to personally express my profound gratitude to you for your tremendous support throughout my stint as Acting Commissioner General.

I am fully aware that you played a pivotal role in my ascendency to my new rank. On my own behalf and that of my family, I sincerely thank you for that.

I promise to work diligently in justifying the faith you reposed in me.

Finally, let me say once again, siyabonga, tinotenda, we thank you for your presence with us here today.

12,531 total views, 1,157 views today

The Age of Isolation is well and truly over. The politics of bitterness are behind us.
What Zimbabweans need from VaMugabe is a responsible and tempered elder statesman who – if unable to at least apologise for the excesses of a criminal faction modelled around his wife – can try and counsel unity, hard work and peace.

Let’s observe a moment of silence for Paul Madyazvivi.

You see, Madyazvivi’s wife reportedly just left the man who is not formally employed, soon after she secured a teaching qualification.

Madyazvivi, we are told, sold a bunch of cattle so that he could pay fees for his wife, Ketina Murambiwa, to attend Masvingo Teachers’ College.

Now that she has qualified as a teacher, she prefers to build her life with a fellow teacher.

It is easy to feel sorry for the man. After all, he lovingly “upgraded” his wife and she turned around and told him that she was now too good for him.

But someone has to play Devil’s advocate.

Was she wrong? Is it not that she fell for this man because her horizons were still limited by her lack of exposure?

As Joice Mujuru would say, anga achiri kakutu kanga kasati kasvinura (she was still a puppy whose eyes had not yet opened) when she married this guy.

One could say they were compatible up to a certain point, after which she needed more from life than he could give.

She did not want to be a Caliban, that Shakespearean savage who tells his enslaver, “You taught me language, and my profit on’t/ Is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you/ For learning me your language!”

This woman instead says, “You taught me language, and my profit on it is that I know now how I want to advance my life.”

It’s the cruel reality of education: with every lesson, the student takes another step on the road towards becoming master to his teacher.

Let us leave Madyazvivi and his troubles for a while and cross over to Italy, a nation that also deserves a moment of silence for the fall of AC Milan and the death of reason.

We hear Silvio Berlusconi is back in the thick of things, styling himself as an “elder statesman” ahead of elections that were due in that country this weekend.

Back in 2011, my colleague Farirai Machivenyika told me – when Mr Bunga Bunga was forced out of office and then subsequently barred from holding public office until 2019 – that the serial Prime Minister of Italy would bounce back.

I didn’t see that happening.

My views had nothing to do with the fact that I blame VaBerlusconi for running down AC Milan, doing for the Rossoneri what Cde Robert Mugabe did for Zimbabwe: taking it to its glory days and then hanging on long enough to take the shine away.

Rather, it was because I just could not see Italians – geniuses who have given the world pizza and pasta – trying to turn back the clock.

But here is Berlusconi, back in the spotlight and ready to become the kingmaker ahead of the lifting of his ban on public office next year.

Never mind the sexism, homophobia, fraud and all manner of inappropriateness associated with the man who took Italy into a recession and more importantly (for me at least), killed AC Milan.

Berlusconi is defying time, hoping for one last hurrah and one last mighty bunga bunga performance.

One critic has described VaBerlusconi as “yesterday’s choice for today’s Italians”.

And it would not be far off the mark to speak of the unfortunate VaMadyazvivi as “yesterday’s choice for today’s Ketina Murambiwa”.

Similarly, Zimbabweans have moved forward.

Cde Mugabe, likely acting as spokesperson for one Grace Mugabe, PhD, does not carry a message for today’s Zimbabweans.

Yes, we laud him for his advances in extending education to as many people as possible.

Now that those people have an education, they thank him for his efforts and are moving on to bigger and better things.

They want an upgrade that goes with their newly-minted sophistication and kindly ask VaMugabe to accept that their world is changing, has changed and will never be the same again.

The Age of Isolation is well and truly over. The politics of bitterness are behind us.

What Zimbabweans need from VaMugabe is a responsible and tempered elder statesman who – if unable to at least apologise for the excesses of a criminal faction modelled around his wife – can try and counsel unity, hard work and peace.

Brinksmanship and recklessness will not rebuild an economy in urgent need of the attentions of all well-meaning citizens.

There can be no bunga bunga approaches to our national affairs; all that ended in November 2017.

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Tau Tawengwa
Ultimately, Chamisa should have been more patient and more humble – he should have waited until Tsvangirai was buried and then contested for the presidency at a congress.
That would have given his critics less fodder, and it would have created the impression that he is a humble, mature, national leader.

Former Prime Minster and opposition MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai was a fortnight ago laid to rest after an arduous battle with cancer.

Indeed, he ran his race and will certainly be remembered in the history of Zimbabwe after coming to prominence as a political player to be reckoned with at the turn of the millennium.

However, his greatest shortfall (as with most African leaders) is that he failed to resolve the succession issue in his party timeously.

Put plainly, he did not have a succession plan, or certainly had not made one public.

I have argued before, and I will state again, that clear succession plans should be there in every institution.

This is true of families, businesses, political parties or any other organisation that desires continuity.

Having said that, MDC-T is a great example of how things go terribly bad when succession is not handled well.

Zeal without Knowledge

Proverbs 19:12 counsels “desire without knowledge is not good, how much more will hasty feet miss the way?”

Like many Zimbabweans, I marvelled at the haste with which Nelson Chamisa and his faction or fraction anointed themselves as heirs to the throne before Tsvangirai was even cold in the ground.

Before Tsvangirai’s body had even been repatriated, Chamisa and crew had already claimed leadership for a 12-month period.

Pastor Chamisa addressed a song-and-dance rally outside Harvest House, during which he declared himself leader to an impressionable congregation of the MDC-T political laity, who thought they had gathered to hear about Tsvangirai’s funeral arrangements.

Instead, they were mischievously misled into believing that Nelson Chamisa was their new leader.

By this self-annointment, Chamisa showed the world his unbridled lust for power.

There is nothing wrong with being ambitious, and if anything, ambition should be encouraged.

However, after carefully observing his brand of politics in recent weeks, I conclude that he will be hoist by his own petard by 2023.

Why the rush?

Like many Zimbabweans, I do not fully understand why Chamisa rushed to arrange an MDC-T National Council meeting prior to Tsvangirai’s burial.

After all, if Chamisa is as popular as some people assume, why could he not engender dignity in Tsvangirai’s final journey.

One theory is that he did this to save his own bacon, because truth be told, his rivals would not have spared him either!

Whatever the reason was for his haste, it is my view that the Chamisa factional rally of February 15 could have triggered the violence we saw at Tsvangirai’s burial.

That was his first mistake. Violence is inexcusable.

Even if Chamisa had nothing to do with the violence, it is on record that in 2014, the then MDC-T deputy treasury-general, Elton Mangoma and secretary-general, Tendai Biti were assaulted by a group of party youths for allegedly calling for leadership renewal in the party.

At the time they said they were attacked by “a drunken mob” and it was alleged that Chamisa was not far from the violence when Mangoma et al got thumped.

A 2014 report of the Mangoma-related mayhem stated that, “Standing amongst the crowd, which was singing and chanting, baying for Mangoma’s blood, snapshots from the video show Chamisa relating to some of the gathered youths.”

After his reported participation in Mangoma’s 2014 attack, allegations are now being made that Chamisa was involved in the violence at Tsvangirai’s funeral, and that he was also involved in Thokozani Khupe’s 2017 attack.

Had he been humble and patient enough to wait to be endorsed after the funeral, he would be free from controversy today.

But now, given the intra-party violence that has occurred in the MDC-T at the alleged instigation of Chamisa, firstly against Mangoma and Biti and later against Khupe, his opponents will continue to suggest that Pr Chamisa is thuggish.

Youth factor

The pro-Chamisa mob says he will win because he is young.

There is a Machiavellian maxim I like which says, “The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.”

Khupe is about 54, Engineer Mudzuri is 60, Eddie Cross is 77 and Welshman Ncube is 56 to name a few.

This means that Nelson Chamisa’s age is only window dressing in the broader scheme of things.

If he is incapacitated or quits politics, then all his potential successors are in their fifties and sixties.

The argument for his age is simplistic populism, and as I have argued before, his competitors are setting him up for a “bhora-musango” scenario.

I reiterate that he should have supported an extraordinary congress after the funeral and challenged for the top position in the MDC-T alongside other potential leaders.

As it stands, when he contests the forthcoming elections as MDC Alliance leader, he will be vulnerable to the political sharks around him after he loses the election.

At that time, the argument against him will be that he is immature, and his saboteurs and critics will not relent until he is dethroned.

Ultimately, Chamisa should have been more patient and more humble – he should have waited until Tsvangirai was buried and then contested for the presidency at a congress.

That would have given his critics less fodder, and it would have created the impression that he is a humble, mature, national leader.

As it stands, his age seems to be the only argument to his advantage, but come inauguration day, his critics will argue against his age, and that could be his undoing.

13,778 total views, 1,273 views today

At the Zimbabwe Trade and Investment Conference in Harare on Friday, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Dr Sibusiso Busi Moyo tackled the issue of Government’s 100-day targets.

The targets were the result of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s first meeting with his Cabinet on December 5, 2017; a meeting at which the Head of State and Government said he expected his ministers to think outside the box and come up with priority projects that bring about positive socio-economic changes within the shortest possible period.

It is in that context that we speak today of “100-day plans”.

The phrase is both a literal expression of achieving quick wins within roughly a quarter of a year, and more importantly a metaphorical expression of creating a cycle of project implementation that goes beyond actual calendar days.

After all, if the 100 days were about calendar days, would this mean a minister who achieves project implementation after 30 days can sit back and wait another 70 days before tackling the next item on the agenda?

Which is what Dr Moyo was speaking to at the Zimbabwe Trade and Investment Conference.

In part, he said, “… According to His Excellency, the 100 days is a management tool to ensure that ministers are accountable for their performance and that ministers can always account for what they have achieved and for what they have not achieved … And I can assure you that when you start at minus five, it takes time to get to one.”

This echoed what Presidential Spokesperson and Secretary for Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Mr George Charamba said in a radio interview on January 14, 2018.

In that instance, Mr Charamba said: “First of all, it is an American concept which we have imported into our own politics, but one which doesn’t take into account the realities that are obtaining in our own situation.

“… if Zimbabweans are counting days hoping for real, measurable, concrete, material changes in their lives within 100 calendar days, then we are likely to meet a crisis of expectation which may not in fact be validated through scientific reckoning.

“… From worst we get to worse, from worse, hopefully we get to bad, and from bad we get to zero, and from zero then we begin to crawl up.”

In short, this means Zimbabweans must not expect a magical turnaround in their socio-economic fortunes in 100 days.

Rather, all shoulders should be put to the wheel so that incremental gains create the gravitas for real economic growth and development that can be measured on the basis of improved livelihoods.

It is about creating a domino effect, where successful implementation of one project feeds implementation of another so that we start registering gains that result in exponential growth of our economic base.

As such, it does not matter if the “100 days” end today, tomorrow or in April.

What matters is this country coming up with measurable economic victories that put food on tables, clothes on backs, roofs over heads, medicines in clinics and hospitals, and withdrawable salaries in bank accounts.

This means the Office of the President must be diligent in monitoring the activities of ministers, and it is good that Information Acting Minister Ambassador Simon Khaya Moyo has promised to make public the “end of term report” on what has happened since the December 5, 2017 Cabinet meeting.

There should be accountability, with ministers — as Dr Moyo has said – being able to tell Zimbabweans where they have succeeded and where they have failed.

More importantly, that “end of term report” must itself be a tool with which we can create the momentum we need to turnaround the economy.

It should not just be about firing ministers, but coming up with strategies to counter whatever failures will have been encountered in the first 100 days so that the next 100 days bring better results.

In that way, a cycle of continuously improving performance will be realised in the quickest possible time.

That said, we will reiterate that building Zimbabwe’s economy is not a job for President Mnangagwa and his team alone.

Government’s role is to create the right conditions for enterprise to flourish, and in turn the people must apply themselves fully to improving our circumstances.

Zimbabwe is in urgent need of an honest day’s work from every citizen and not cynicism that inspires lethargy and detracts attention from the things we all should be doing every single day and not just for 100 days.

The first 100 days, the next 100 days, and the years thereafter are everyone’s child.

29,153 total views, 2,415 views today

Debra Matabvu
In 1994, Mary (not her real name) fled the infamous Rwandan genocide and sought refuge in Zimbabwe. More than two decades later, Mary is set to return to her native country, a journey, given a choice, she would not embark on. “The journey to Zimbabwe was not easy. I left Rwanda when I was only 19,” she said, shelling a maize cob. And I know returning and settling down in Rwanda will not be easy. It has been 22 years since I left Rwanda, where will I go? What will happen to my children? What does the future hold for me there? Zimbabwe is my home now and Tongogara is my village,” she said.

Mary is among the 240 Rwandan refugees in Zimbabwe set to return to Rwanda this year. This follows the invoking of the cessation clause by United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) which declared Rwanda a conflict-free zone, after years of inter-ethnic conflicts. The cessation targets refugees who fled the country between 1959 and 1996. Like many others in her situation, Mary has her doubts, as the wounds of the conflict are yet to heal. Fear still persists, but it is of a different kind – fear of the unknown.

“I ran away because of ethnic conflict, I feared for my life then. Today I fear the future because it is uncertain. I do not know what it holds,” she said.

“My grandfather had two wives of different tribes, my grandmother was from the Hutu tribe while the other was Tutsi.

“When my grandfather died in 1994, conflict arose over who would control his estate, this was exacerbated by the civil war that followed thereafter. My family decided to leave the area and head to Democratic Republic of Congo. However, before we got there I had separated with my parents and siblings. I do not know if they are still alive.

“When I got to Congo, I got a job as a farm labourer in a town near the border. Shortly thereafter, one of the farm superiors started raping me and he ended up taking me as one of his many wives. After giving birth to two girls. He chased me away and said I was useless. A local pastor helped me, by offering to send me to Zimbabwe.”

Although she had never heard of Zimbabwe, she took her daughters and headed to this unknown destination.

Rwanda has over the last years been declared safe and conflict-free with dozens of its citizens voluntarily going back. Since 2009, several states have been encouraging Rwandan refugees to return to their native country.

At the beginning of the year, the cessation clause came into effect, which means many Rwandan refugees would no longer have the rights, freedoms, and protections guaranteed by international protocols for refugees.

Those who remain in host countries will be treated as illegal immigrants.

Minister for Labour and Social Welfare, Hon Petronella Kagonye, recently indicated that the country was finalising the issue.

“In Zimbabwe, we are in the process of finalising the legal processes of declaring that cessation and we shall issue out a joint statement together with the UNHCR once all the processes are finalised.” Minister Kagonye said.

She said the decision to repatriate the refugees would be made on a case-by-case basis and was expected to be finalised this month. Minister Kagonye said Zimbabwe has about 11 000 refuges, straining already scarce resources.

“We have been receiving more than 30 refugees per day and that has been problematic for us because the resources we currently have do not meet the numbers at the camp. At Tongogara Refugee Camp, we have more than 11 000 refugees and we are struggling to provide social service such as the teacher-student ratios, the land they occupy and other administrative issues.”

For Mary she prays for exemption. “I have a family. I am now married to a Congolese man and we have four daughters,” she explained. “If I am repatriated I will have to leave my husband behind as he is not affected by the cessation. I will have to take the children with me since I was registered as their guardian. That is not the kind of life I want for my children.”

The UNHCR agreed to provide return incentives for the Rwandan returnees. The commission was offering cash packages to any Rwandan refugee who returned home before end of 2017. The commission gave $250 to each adult Rwandan refugee and $150 to any minor who returned home. The returnees were also offered free medical insurance for a year, a free mobile phone and free transportation to any destination within the country.

As part of the cessation process, “go-see, come-and-tell missions” have been under taken by the refugees who were assisted to travel to Rwanda.

UNHCR says the refugees that have taken the missions have been successful with positive reports on the situation being reported back. One of the refugees who took part in the mission, John (not real name), says although the situation has largely changed in Rwanda he was not willing to go back.

“I went to Rwanda in 2015 to assess the situation and the situation has changed. However, Zimbabwe is our home and we appeal to the Government of Zimbabwe to give us permanent residency and integrate us into the communities.”

Despite its haphazard settlement pattern, with mud-and-pole make-shift structures and uneven gravel roads, the Tongogara settlement is dear to its inhabitants. And the only “repatriation” they are willing to take part in is within the borders of Zimbabwe.

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“You get people who are so popular for some reason and come to Parliament, but they do not have the basic academic tools … Some of the Bills address complicated and technical issues and they (legislators) get lost (during debate).”

The above observation was made by Speaker of the National Assembly Advocate Jacob Mudenda in 2014 while addressing National Defence College students.

Adv Mudenda’s statement rang true last week as lawmakers said they did not know how to manage a US$50 000 Constituency Development Fund.

Instead, they want to “employ and pay” people to manage US$50 000.

Adv Mudenda had said: “Members who have received CDFs for constituency projects are reminded to submit their monthly, quarterly and annual returns to Parliament Management Committee in terms of Article 524 of the Accounting Officers Instructions.

“The documents to be submitted include, but not limited to; returns of expenditure; returns of bank reconciliation statements; returns of assets purchased; and project job cards.”

That is when Warren Park House of Assembly representative Engineer Elias Mudzuri (MDC-T) suggested lawmakers employ people to do this for them.

“On the accounting manual and on the process of running this account there is no room for employing an accounting officer,” said the legislator who is also MDC-T co-deputy president.

“You will find out that the Member of Parliament becomes the accounting officer … There must be that allowance where you have to allow for employment of somebody who runs the accounts. It is very difficult for (legislators) to be able to do it.”

Cde Remigious Matangira (Zanu-PF) of Bindura South proposed scrapping the requirement of submitting a project card — a detailed breakdown of the project and timelines.

His argument was that this required the skills of people better equipped than MPs.

According to Section 125 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, a person is eligible to stand for a House of Assembly seat if he/she is a registered voter and at least 21 years old. Senators must be at least 40 years old and registered voters.

The supreme law does not say anything about educational qualifications.

But it is strange that our lawmakers cannot administer a US$50 000 fund and yet one of their key duties is to protect public funds.

Southern African Parliamentary Support Trust executive director Mr John Makamure says: “If you have been given public funds you cannot then say I don’t have skills to account for each and every cent.

“They (legislators) need to acquire the skills and account. People need to know what their money was used for. Whether the legislators are educated or not, they cannot give such excuses, that excuse is unacceptable.”

At the same time, MPs are pressing Government to pay them their dues — even as they admit they do not know have the skills to do their jobs.

The life of Parliament is expected to be terminated in a few months as the country prepares for fresh polls in mid-2018.

Musikavanhu legislator Mr Prosper Mutseyami (MDC-T) is at the forefront of agitating for disbursement of residential stands to MPs before their terms of office expire.

“Our term is coming to an end. Mr Speaker Sir, I request your esteemed office, as the chairperson (of the Welfare Committee) and Speaker of the National Assembly, to facilitate for us as Members of Parliament to hold an urgent joint caucus so that we deliberate on issues to do with our welfare and outstanding issues that have not been addressed to date.

“Members have been given numbers, with regard to stands, yet there is no offer letter or anything – they are just numbers. So we need to make sure that we put this thing to an end, then we see who is playing games with who and how? Then we come up with a solution.”

Political analyst Mr Godwine Mureriwa said such behaviour eroded public confidence in the legislature.

“The President is talking about servant leadership and MPs have to take a leaf from that. The problem is that the electorate is bribed to vote for undeserving parliamentarians.

“The fear is that they are not going to be re-elected, so Government should not be forced to meet unnecessary demands and ignore topical issues of rebuilding the economy.”

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Wendy Nyakurerwa-Matinde Assistant Editor
While elections are the embodiment of democracy, it is crucial that they be prefixed by “free and fair” to achieve their true objective feat, otherwise they become soiled with non-credibility.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa is aware of this, which is why he has already pledged a free, fair and credible election on numerous occasions.

But his Government will have to pass through a huge barricade in achieving this, and has to move very fast to nip this problem in the bud.

Herein lies the problem.

The opposition MDC-T is well aware sure that it stands no chance of defeating a rejuvenated Zanu-PF following the resignation of former president Robert Mugabe in November 2017.

With the old man long gone, and having noted that the ruling party has no appetite for factional squabbles as it prepares the ground for its 2018 electoral victory, MDC-T members have resolved to throw stones at each other.

And they will try to blame Zanu-PF for their own defeat and their lack of popularity with the majority of Zimbabweans.

Apparently, self-destructive violence is the opposition’s new strategy.

Instead of clean polls, the opposition is itching for violence-marred elections. The objective is to make the elections as bloody as possible, such that they will appear non-credible.

Harvest House is the epicentre of this “Operation Discredit Elections”.

But the chaos currently devouring the opposition was long in coming.

The internal democracy of this “democratic” movement has always been called into question. Relations between the party’s godfather, the late Morgan Tsvangirai, its members, as well as that of its structures, brought about the dearth of its internal democracy.

While the party fervently seeks to sell democracy in its relationship with society, it has not escaped many people that democracy, which has to come from within, has always been elusive in the mother of the several MDCs that have afflicted Zimbabwe over the past two or so decades.

The recent Buhera pact, for example, which disgustingly declared that no “Ndebele girl” can ever lead the MDC-T, might have raised a lot of dust but it is definitely not an isolated case of non- democracy.

For the past 20 years in which the MDC has fallen and fallen, members have always been discriminated upon on the basis of tribe and gender.

It has been a tradition that the party unleashes violence and bigotry on anyone who challenges its tribal and patriarchal narrative.

The fog is starting to dissipate from Madame Thokozani Khupe’s eyes now, in the same way it did from the eyes of Mr Elton Mangoma, Mr Tendai Biti, Ambassador Trudy Stevenson and Professor Welshman Ncube.

This is a political party that has always been democratically inclined externally but undemocratic internally.

We are talking of a party that cannot practise what it preaches, and we will see more of the same before and after the harmonised elections this year and well into the future.

Therefore, the predicament of the MDC-T is that its naïve members are gradually waking up to the reality that the democracy that was being sold to them was a dummy and that the people leading them are power-hungry violence-mongers.

Everyone can now see that the MDC-T is nothing more than an assemblage of self-interested people who operate against the public good and do not care about those they claim to lead and those they say they want to lead.

The MDC-T knows that it cannot have the cake of national leadership, and it reckons that as such no one should have it. Where I come from, they call it “shayisano”.

The leaders of the opposition will besmirch their internal rivals and also excoriate their external rivals when the inevitable 2018 electoral loss comes to pass.

We have already started seeing the MDC-T’s blood ways long before the President has even declared an election date.

We are going to see more blood as the elections draw closer.

The international community is going to see even more gory pictures as this despicable charade goes on.

Be prepared for more MDC-T violence when Advocate Nelson Chamisa loses in the harmonised elections and his internal enemies try and replace him.

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Tau Tawengwa
All eyes are on President Emmerson Mnangagwa and opposition politicians are taking every opportunity to mud-sling and critique his first 100 days in office.

Their claim is that “nothing has changed” and that the new Government has failed to fulfil its promises.

“Analysts” have pointed to the continuing cash crisis, price increases and general economic hardship as evidence that nothing has changed.

Yet things have been happening.

In his inaugural speech, President Mnangagwa assured the nation that he would take all necessary steps to bring economic relief to a weary citizenry.

Let us fairly assess how that has gone.

One centre of power

Under the leadership of President Mnangagwa, Zanu-PF’s Central Committee resolved to remove any notion of “one centre of power” from the ruling party’s constitution.

Although this was an internal party issue, it is also a preamble to the democratic roadmap that is being implemented by the new administration.

For those who care to remember, the “one centre of power” principle essentially gave imperial powers to the previous Zanu-PF leader, and prior to November 2017, it had inspired unprecedented lunacy and blasphemy in the ruling party.

“He is our Messiah. He is second to Jesus. He is our liberator. We honour God and you are our Jesus.”

Those were the kinds of things we were hearing of the then president, Mr Robert Mugabe, before November 24, 2017. That is what the “one centre of power” doctrine had amounted to – absolute power to an individual.

At least now, Zimbabwe is starting to feel like a democracy again.

Free, fair and credible

elections

I think it is fair to say that the removal of the “one centre of power” doctrine turned on the democratic light in the country after a long period of darkness.

Now, for the first time in many years, we have heard our Government committing to holding free, fair and credible elections.

We have also heard President Mnangagwa not only speak about peace and tolerance, but he has also welcomed international electoral monitors and observers from the United Nations and European Union.

“But now, with this new dispensation, I don’t feel threatened by anything. I would want the United Nations to come, the EU should come. If the Commonwealth were requesting to come, I am disposed to consider their application,” the President has said.

As far as I’m concerned, that is the biggest win yet, because the holding of free, fair and credible elections resonates with the President’s call that “Zimbabwe is open for business”.

The commitment to hold of free, fair and credible elections is, therefore, perhaps President Mnangagwa’s most significant 100-day success.

Open for business

After years of counter-progressive isolationism and consequent economic regression, it was refreshing to see us well represented at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where our delegation reiterated the message that “Zimbabwe is open for business”.

While others might take it lightly, our maiden appearance in Davos was a major boost for the country and the near future looks bright.

While critics of the new dispensation strut about saying “nothing has changed”, I for one disagree saying our attitude as a country has changed.

Our leadership paradigm has now shifted and we are now looking in the right direction as a country.

One cannot expect a newborn baby to crawl, walk, talk, and read in its first 100 days.

Furthermore, citizens cannot expect the President to literally come to their houses and physically put food on their tables. If you are a businessperson, you cannot expect the President to come to your shop, market your business and do your accounts.

Put plainly, we as citizens should not expect to be spoon-fed by the new administration. We need to complement its efforts with sound strategy and hard work.

The best that the new administration can do for us all is to create an environment that is conducive for investment and for business to thrive.

As it stands, it is notable that our tourism authorities have anticipated that the visitors to Zimbabwe’s Victoria Falls will increase by 30 percent between January and April 2018.

That is a sign that the Government’s work is bearing fruit.

Also, the Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce has recently stated that “in a nutshell there is a bright future for Zimbabwe’s economy to be trending in a northward direction after the Davos experience”.

In this light, our Government should continue positively marketing the country and follow through on its commitment to hold free and fair elections.

Going forward

Lately, there has been significant noise, particularly on social media, regarding the recently released information that 60 percent of registered voters are below the age of 40.

The resultant misconception is that because Nelson Chamisa is 40, then 60 percent of voters that are below 40 will automatically vote him.

That is not the case.

Firstly, there are a significant number of below 40 voters who are optimistic about the new dispensation.

I know some who are farmers, and beneficiaries of the Government’s Command Agriculture programme.

Last season, some farmers that I know managed to yield up to 21 tonnes per hectare on 200 hectares, meaning they made a gross profit of over a million dollars.

Now that’s what I call empowerment.

As a result, I seriously doubt that those ladies and gentlemen will vote for anything other than Zanu-PF in 2018.

The same applies to the approximately 300 000 families that are beneficiaries of the Command Agriculture programme and the one million households that benefited from the Presidential Inputs Scheme.

Even in the cities, I have perceived that sentiment is divided between the opposition and Zanu-PF.

This time round, many youths are willing to give Zanu-PF another term in office, while many others are disgruntled by the violence that has been occurring in the opposition ranks since Morgan Tsvangirai’s death.

It is a fallacy to say that because voters are predominately below 40, they will automatically vote for the opposition.

This time round, Zanu-PF could win a significant number of seats in the cities.

It is my view that people are hopeful, and generally supportive of the new administration. I think we can safely say that President Mnangagwa has done well under the circumstances.

Perhaps the most pinching discontentment among the citizenry is the persistent cash crisis.

If Government could expediently assist in making cash available in our banks it would bring welcome relief to the populace.

Other than that, so far so good.

If Zimbabwe continues on its current trajectory, we will certainly experience an economic boom in the near future.

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Last Friday, Zimbabwe launched the National Mine Action Strategic Plan 2018-2025. We publish Vice-President Dr Constantino Chiwenga’s speech at the event.

It gives me great pleasure to address you today on this launch of the Zimbabwe National Mine Action Strategic Plan for the period 2018 to 2025.

As alluded to by the Secretary for Defence and War Veterans Affairs in his welcome remarks, the term Mine Action refers to all issues relating to landmines, that is; stockpile, destruction, mine clearance, mine risk education, victim assistance and advocacy.

Therefore, today we are launching a strategy for tackling all mine action activities in Zimbabwe between 2018 and 2025, when we expect to complete the clearance of all mined areas in the country.

As you may all be aware, this event was scheduled to take place on Friday 24 November 2017, which day coincided with the inauguration of His Excellency, the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, Comrade ED Mnangagwa as Head of State.

Consequently, the launch was deferred up to this day.

The situation in the country has been calm, peaceful and obviously progressive. The Government is preparing to hold free and credible elections as promised by His Excellency, the President, in various fora.

The Government is also preoccupied with creating a conducive environment for economic revival through foreign direct investment in various sectors of our economy under the mantra “Zimbabwe is open for business”.

A Zimbabwe that is open for business entails a country that is safe and risk free.

Therefore, the launch of the Zimbabwe National Mine Action Strategic Plan 2018 to 2025 is meant to clear the remaining minefields in the country and make the areas safe for human habitation.

The need for a strategic plan mine action in Zimbabwe became apparent as our operators continued to deal with the country’s landmine problem in the various areas.

Zimbabwe needed to answer the question of how she intended to deal and finish the remaining landmine challenge, which further necessitated the need for a strategic plan.

The issue of the strategic plan had also been raised by the Committee on Landmine Clearance of the Ottawa Convention during consideration of the country’s fourth extension request.

Zimbabwe heeded to this concern and initiated consultations with the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD) in November 2016 in Santiago, Chile.

A formal proposal was then presented to Government, which was approved without any challenges, leading to commencement of the process.

The Zimbabwe National Mine Action Strategic Plan is a policy document crafted by Government in collaboration with strategic partners in charge of mine action in Zimbabwe under the auspices of the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining.

The main purpose of the plan is to guide Zimbabwe’s mine action players in their operations.

It clearly sets out the goals and objectives as well as the strategies for achieving them.

The plan also stipulates the estimated quantity of resources required in order to complete the remaining landmine challenge in the country.

The Zimbabwe National Mine Action Strategic Plan is in two main parts. The first part, which gives the background to the landmine problem in Zimbabwe, dates back to the country’s liberation struggle during the late 1970s as has been pointed out in the presentation by the director, Zimbabwe Mine Action Centre.

The first part of the strategic plan also spells out the mission statement which reads: “To develop a sustainable national mine action programme that facilitates effective and efficient survey and clearance activities and addresses the needs of affected communities through well-coordinated activities in accordance with the National Mine Action Standards and Convention obligations.”

It is also in this part of the strategy that the vision of a mine-free Zimbabwe where women, girls, boys and men safely engage in sustainable livelihood activities and where mine victims are fully integrated into society is also spelt.

The second part outlines four strategic goals to be pursued by the operating teams.

The goals relate to the five pillars of mine action which are stockpile destruction, survey and clearance, mine risk education, victim assistance and advocacy.

Zimbabwe currently has four accredited international demining organisations (IDOs) working in the country.

Two of these are the Hazardous Areas Life Support Organisation (Halo) Trust and Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA).

They have been working in Zimbabwe since 2012 and have registered significant progress in their respective areas of responsibility.

The remaining two, that is, Mines Advisory Group (MAG) and Apopo, are recently accredited organisation and fairly new in the country.

MAG started operations in December 2017, while Apopo is still setting up and also mobilising funding from the donor community.

Apopo is expected to start operations soon.

The fifth player is our National Mine Clearance Unit, a squadron of military engineers specialising in landmine clearance.

The squadron has registered tremendous progress in the Sango Border Post minefield where they are deployed, albeit against resource constrains.

The military deminers are currently working on one stretch of the double stretch of Sango Border Post to Crooks Corner minefield. The other stretch was allocated to Apopo.

As at November 2017, the Halo Trust and NPA were operating with 30 and seven deminers teams respectively.

However, NPA has since reduced its teams to four following a reduction in funding.

The NPA’s four teams are complemented by a mine detection dog team while funding for the two international demining non-governmental organisations is provided by the British, Americans, Japanese, Norwegian, Swiss, Irish and other donor governments and organisations.

The Government of Zimbabwe greatly appreciates the support rendered by the donor community which has significantly contributed to the clearance of large portions of minefields in the country.

We are aware that the Japanese have recently funded the Halo Trust to the tune of US$2 353 041 which was divided into three separate contracts.

Today, we witnessed the signing agreement of US$634 597 for the 2018 financial year between the Japanese government and Halo Trust.

The continued funding of demining programmes by the Japanese government is a welcome gesture.

May I therefore I appeal to donor agencies already funding demining in Zimbabwe to consider increasing the funding.

In the same vein, we urge others with the capacity, to consider funding and supporting this noble humanitarian cause for the sake of Zimbabwe’s future generations.

A boost in funding will enhance the demining operations by increasing the number of teams hence expedite the completion of the programme.

This indeed is the desired end-state, as we grapple with challenges of totally eradicating the landmine challenge that has negatively impacted on the economic development and safety of our communities, living around the mining areas.

As such, I urge those in charge of mine action in this country to pay particular attention to the last part of the strategy that lays out key commitments related to monitoring, evaluation and review of the strategy.

This is important in refocusing and determining progress or lack of it in the implementation of the strategy.

I am aware that some of the targets are dependent on availability of funding for various demining players and cooperating partners.

In this regard, let me repeat my earlier appeal to those with the capacity and in a position to fund mine action in Zimbabwe to join hands with the four accredited demining organisations that I mentioned earlier.

The Government is aware that some donor agencies are not prepared to directly fund our military deminers, who despite limited resources, have done commendable work in the areas where they have been deployed.

With additional support in the form of material resources, the military deminers can augment the efforts of the accredited demming organisations.

Ladies and gentleman, allow me to appreciate the International Committee of the Red Cross for their assistance in capacitating our military deminers. The military deminers have since 2012 been receiving tremendous support from the ICRC, that has enabled them to clear a significant chunk of the Sango Border Post to Crooks Corner minefield.

Some of requirements of military deminers include protective clothing, mine detectors and reliable ambulances for causality evacuation.

As I conclude, ladies and gentleman, allow me to express my sincere thanks to the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining for funding and guiding the process of crafting the Mine Action Strategic Plan until completion of the document.

We are indeed grateful for your assistance in this regard. I also wish to thank the ICRC for again partnering us in organising today’s launching ceremony and sponsoring most of the items related to the event.

This goes to explain the long- standing fruitful co-operation between the Ministry of Defence and War Veterans Affairs and the ICRC, which I wish should continue into the unforeseeable future.

I also wish to thank all the mine action stakeholders that took part in the process of crafting the strategic plan.

These also include the ICRC, the Implementation Support Unit, the United Nations Development Programme, our esteemed operators and fellow Government ministries and departments. We are proud of you all for your valuable contributions to the noble cause of creating a mine-free Zimbabwe by 2025.

With those remarks, distinguished guests, ladies and gentleman, it is my honour to declare the Zimbabwe National Mine Action Strategic Plan duly launched.

Tatenda. Siyabonga. I thank you.

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George Charamba
In one of his mature Odes, Quintus Horatius Flaccus, better known in the English-speaking world as Horace, coined the famous “delicta maiorum immeritus lues”.

Now sounding pedantic and obscure in a world where Latin is decidedly dead both as a spoken and written language, this line of timeless counsel and warning roughly translates to “you undeservingly pay for the failings of the ancestors”.

Horace wrote his Odes at a tumultuous time when feudal Rome bled from civil upheavals at home, and debilitating wars abroad.

Soon Julius Caesar would be dead, assassinated in 44BCE, forcing a whole generation of otherwise hopeful youngsters, Horace among them, to enlist in the military under the generalship of Caesar’s killer, Brutus, by then Rome’s new ruler.

Before long, Brutus would himself also fall to Rome’s violent, supplanting sword, to be replaced by Octavian, better known in history as Augustus Caesar.

Beyond these bloody internal conflicts, and ironically enough, Rome faced a period of unprecedented biological expansion, but one contradicted by a crippling pressure on scarce farming land thanks to a limiting geography and gross social inequities.

The poor continued to be displaced, the displaced continued to get poorer; in the end both groups desperately voting with their feet.

The net result was the swelling of Rome’s cities already overburdened by an ill-fed, restive, floating and jobless underclass.

And from this prolonged, distracting national and social crisis, Rome’s once famed and imposing edifices and temples were crumbling, spewing implacable sorrows that blighted its citizenry while foreclosing prospects for many generations to come.

For Horace, Rome was thus paying for neglect by its “gods”.

To escape this unhappy fate bearing down so heavily on it, Rome and her sapped and wizened children needed to roll up sleeves; needed to bend double to put everything right.

An unhappy and morose generation Rome thus raised and had, one born bitter, fated to survive behind its broken walls and its tumbling temples.

In the eyes of Horace’s censorious generation, everything pointed to failings of Rome’s ancestors, all of which now had to be repaid undeservingly by itself.

Traverse ancient times and the world of Rome, fast-forward to modern times into Zimbabwe under Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, with the Horatian aphorism in mental tow.

The temptation to draw an analogy is irresistible.

Unavoidably, you are hit by both incongruities and parallels.

Incongruities to the extent that ED – like most of us still in Government – parallels Horace’s “ancestors” whom the current generation is wont to blame for the unhappy state in which “Rome” finds itself. Seemingly blameworthy, that places ED outside the pronominal “you” covered and impliedly exonerated by Horace’s aphorism.

The “you” whose referent is the generation which unfairly pays and puts right failings of its ancestors.

Except to think so amounts to taking cheap, oppositional pot-shots at ED, something strongly tempting and hardly unexpected as we creep near and nearer the election season.

For with the election season come easy analyses, even easier verdicts.

But such lack of balance in analyses and evaluations is not for national platforms where thoughtful discourse must unfold and reign, always tempered by sense, scale and sound perspective.

Not so with the current debate on ED’s first 100 days in office, a debate which on balance, seems to suffer from, and to be blurred by easy ratings, hasty and pre-conceived condemnation of “Rome’s failing ancestors”.

There is more to further complicate balanced assessment: an inordinate build-up of oversized yet understandable crisis of expectation spawned by “Rome’s” prolonged social distress.

Both factors have made Zimbabweans to crave to find a scapegoat. Both factors have made Zimbabweans think and expect “Rome” to be re-built in a day!

Much worse, there is a serious conceptual handicap in the whole debate, one quite embarrassing given our vaunted level of literacy.

A simple management notion and tool – 100 days in this case – has been taken and understood literally, and has been turned into a measurement of a political tenure of a leader who is still new and has just begun finishing the tail-end of an about-exhausted term of his predecessor.

How a nation famed for lofty tertiary accomplishments mistakes notion of “100 days” which is culled from foreign history, and from the toolbox of an implementation management theory – Results Based Management or its variant called Rapid Results Initiative – for a socio-economic miracle, one just can’t fathom.

Reduced to absurdity, the notion of 100 days has been viewed as a calendar issue, a manual exercise where waiting citizens tick and count down days as these pass, tick and count from the comfort of their armchairs, while ED single-handedly slogs it out for them, pounding and forging goodness whose delivery on our hungry tables falls due on the 100th day pronto!

At the end of which solitary Presidential effort – lo and behold – up and out pops a “brave new world” where everything is in abundance; where everyone eats everlastingly to the fill of their bellies, thereby turning a once morose generation happy ever after!

Decidedly a delectable model for repairing and rebuilding Rome’s the crumbled temples, except only in the never-never land!

Again from the ensuing debate one also gets an apocryphal tale of epochal closure.

A neat age born on ED’s inauguration day, and then closed and securely fastened a lazy 100 days later.

Not quite the same as ticking away calendar time and watching the heavenly sun peep up, grow older, and then glowingly die.

But something deeper – epochal – to suggest fundamental social changes wrought by, and in, those hundred epochal days! And because there is closure attached to it, those 100 days then define a political career, define and encompass ED’s term.

Depending on resultant verdict – and by whom – ED either strolls to a renewed mandate, belauded; or gets dismissed and discarded, tearfully.

So, it’s not strange that both verdicts and fates do fly about nowadays, of course largely depending on the beholder.

There is yet a third dimension which one gets from the whole debate.

The 100 days must and should correct problems, sorry all “failings”, by “Rome’s ancestors”, failings spanning over nearly 38 years that have elapsed from Zimbabwe’s creation day.

Short of this, then it means same head only dressed with a different haircut!

This argument is given legitimacy by an accompanying sub-plot which says that ED, after all, served as a minister for the larger part of that period! And who would deny that?

But that fact of history is then summoned to persecute him, to make him blameworthy as a failing ancestor.

It is this reasoning which gives birth to what I call ED’s “Horatian burden”.

But this so-called “deserved burden” needs to be examined, interrogated, so we determine its legitimacy, its utility therefore, in the current argument and situation.

My submission is straightforward: it does not take much to show how mistaken, empty and fallacious this whole argument is.

I will just raise a few commonsensical counts that fault and even ridicule it.

First, it is not unanimously given that Rome’s ancestors, of which ED was a part, failed. Commonsensical – how does a generation that founded a nation fail?

Can a non-existent Rome have ancestors in the first place, fail in the second place, when both require and imply Rome’s prior existence?

Which is to say – and I say it boldly – Rome’s founding ancestry is its own raison d’etre!

Whatever it’s failings, however blameworthy, it can never be repudiated by children of Home, sorry, Rome.

Simply, it carries to the grave and beyond privileges of founders of any nation.

You might not find this pleasing but it is a fact. That accords ED’s generation a certain pre-existent and imperishable validity, indeed puts ED and his generation of freedom fighter beyond the debate of national culpability.

If you want to nail this privileged generation, look for other sins! But be sure these are sins before creation.

Rome has to become, has to come into being, has to be founded before it has its walls and temples which then fall and crumble, indeed which then must be re-built by whomsoever, whenever in Rome’s infinite life.

What is more, Rome has to remain in being for it to have “failing ancestors” who neglect its temples.

This is how the primacy of Independence and continued sovereignty comes in, pre-dating and preceding the advent of a blaming, self-righteous generation.

It is that simple, logical.

I may sound flimsy and rationalising. Except I am making an argument founded in history and with universal validity, even though Zimbabwe might tragically choose to be lost to it.

The Americans revere George Washington not because he was sinless. Or that he founded and ran an administratively clean, ever-achieving, faultless government. Or that under him no American walls and temples cracked and tumbled.

As a matter of historical fact they did; they still do.

But America and its history panegyrizes him for giving them a nation, for giving them their Rome!

All else stood tolerated by his contemporary citizens; stands tolerated and forgiven by successor generations of America ad infinitum.

A key ingredient to forging a sense of nationality is myth-making around a nation’s founding ancestry, which however failing, stands excused and endlessly polished for all time refulgence.

A founding generation can never exceed the threshold of collective national tolerance, whether by time, or by changing national exigencies!

In any case, ED’s generation cannot be visibly eligible for blame over the 37 years of failings while being invisible and un-praiseworthy for the pre-1980 struggles which created the very Zimbabwe they stand blamed for ruining.

And to make this point and the preceding one is not to seek to place this founding generation beyond scrutiny. Or even to imply or suggest that they have an everlasting mandate to govern or mis-govern.

It is simply to insist on sense, scale and perspective on the verdict we pass on it, in relation to supervening processes of post-coloniality. Critically, it helps us situate developments of the past more than 37 years.

We cannot choose but accept a broad evolutionary perspective by means of which we escape the pitfall evident elsewhere in our region and beyond where post-liberation politics – whether oppositional or governing – become anti-liberation politics that repudiate a people’s founding processes, a people’s founding heroes and, thereby repudiates a Nation.

This takes me to the second fallacy.

It does not make sense for anyone to make ED the fall guy for problems of an era for which he was not the Patriarch.

One cannot describe him as a minister for those 37 odd years without entering an argument in his mitigation, if not defence.

Until November last year when ED became President, this country had a President and a leader. A patriarch occupying the highest pedestal in the pantheon of Rome’s ancestors!

And he lives, even though now out of office.

Does it really make sense to load ED’s first 100 days with the cure, or expectations of it, for alleged failings of a dispensation in which he was a ministerial minion?

Does the notion of delegated authority mean anything to this whole debate? Does the notion of responsibility mean anything at all in this whole debate?

We argue as if the above notions don’t apply to Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans.

We scapegoat wantonly as if we have not seen the inside of a management school. Just check how the whole debate on disturbances that rocked our country soon after Independence has unfolded.

You would think this country had no leader, no executive Prime Minister, no Commander-in-Chief for the duration of those disturbances.

And if minors can become majors for our convenience, then why talk about usurpation of power this last November when in fact your arguments impliedly make ED the Principal right from Zimbabwe’s creation day?

Please Zimbabweans, let’s make up our minds!

You can’t have an argument where you crowd national goodness with so many fathers, while orphaning national failings in the same breadth.

And if minions can shoulder blame for failings of the past 37 years, why doesn’t the same logic excuse ED for the 100 days posited as failing days?

To me the whole argument is both illogical and insincere.

Beyond this insincerity, who does not know that at the heart of what commentators have glibly termed succession battles which raged in the ruling party before this new era, was a clash of contending visions on post-Land Reform Zimbabwe?

That pitted against a greedy and ambitious cabal was a group of veteran-cadres, both inside and outside Government, who saw beyond the worn and staid rhetoric of old nationalism and Cold-War type of anti-Western politics which though central to the liberation struggle and the recovery of Land, had become a needless cost after 2015?

Or that this firebrand rhetoric had become a smokescreen for primitive accumulation by a few, while duping the youths through empty promises of indigenisation and empowerment for which there is absolutely nothing to show on the ground as I write?

Except of course a badly depressed economy, an isolated country and high incidences of corruption?

And to point out these excesses is not to undermine my founding premise, namely that founding ancestors broadly deserve to enjoy a pre-existent culpability benefit in the national estimate.

That premise simply says whatever mistakes of commission and/or omission which this generation makes, these can never be a basis for repudiating or de-legitimising it given its founding role in the national process.

And where the founding generation shows a capacity to overtake and transform itself through vigorous self-criticism, genuine self-correction and bold self-renewal, but without jeopardising national peace, national stability and national cohesion, then it makes itself even less culpable, in fact untouchable, in the national estimate.

Zanu-PF showed this capacity last November, which is how it was able to mobilise and create a broad front for its own, and for national transformation, all to give us the new order whose management hallmark is the much misunderstood 100-day accountability cycle.

It simply does not make sense to tether and judge ED by the more than 37 years which have gone by while acknowledging the two-week November 2017 revolution which made him eligible for the 100-day assessment.

For implied by the whole countdown is an acceptance that a rupture took place following those two weeks, one that abstracted ED from a past he shared but did not direct, and placed him in a new era for which he now stands fully accountable.

The 100 days that have gone by are neither a term nor a delivery schedule for an instant panacea to challenges that have built over more than three decades of our Independence.

Those legacy challenges can be explained by certain hard choices the founding generation had to make when it found itself in the governing saddle.

There was a whole baneful legacy of near-century colonialism which had to be reversed. Spectacularly, the founding generation reversed a century’s ills in just about 37 years.

It did more.

It created a foundation for future growth: by way of securing Independence, national peace and cohesion; by way of creating an educated nation; by way of restoring land rights; and by way of laying infrastructure for expanded social services.

A key principle in economics is that any choice you make levies a cost by way of foregone alternatives.

Economists have a term for it: opportunity cost.

One would have to be naive to think that all of the above gains of the past 37 years would be got and enjoyed without levying opportunity costs. Or that except for its failing ancestors, Zimbabwe could have discovered another path of development which would have been cost-free to the current generation.

Until another life on another planet under other laws is found, for as long as the scarcity factor exists, any choice a generation makes creates costs for those to come.

Which means every generation pays a cost arising from choices made by its predecessors.

The only issue is size of the cost. But a cost there will always be.

Horace can be forgiven for thinking before the advent and development of a “dismal science” we call economics.

But with the hindsight of this science, Horace’s aphorism reads like some stupidity only cleverly put.

ED should invent or deserve his own burdens. Not Horace’s.

There is no 100 days to count, stop and condemn. There is only a performance and execution continuum, only partitioned into small, executable, manageable, incremental acts between which are 100-day cycles for tracking, monitoring, evaluation and, if need be, adjustments. The first act or task wrapped by the first 100 days was for ED to set goals, show direction and define strategies towards those goals.

Above all, it was about breaking a ponderous inertia which had set in, stymying all initiatives. Getting the country to work again, and in honesty, within a permissive and supportive environment both nationally and globally. If the 100 days gone by did not deliver all these, by all means crucify him. But not for failing to rebuild Rome in a day.

Kwete! Bodo! Hwava!

 Mr George Charamba is the Secretary for Information, Media and Broadcasting Services and Presidential Press Secretary. He wrote this article for The Sunday Mail

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SO much has been happening since the Bishop was away. So, so much! Morgan Tsvangirai was buried with his MDC-T in Buhera. Thokozani Khupe was butchered by hoodlums in the crumbs of what’s left of the MDC-T. Nelson Chamisa grabbed the MDC-T crumbs right under the nose of Khupe and the unlikeable Elias Mudzuri.

The young but unnecessarily excitable Chamisa, who some say has already been captured by the MDC-T hoodlums, has even gone to the extent of promising gullible Zimbabweans a bullet train. His visibly stunned audience at Chinhoyi wondered what the little boy was talking about. Bullet train to an audience in Chinhoyi? Well, as Chamisa was busy building castles in the air, Khupe and his boys were bleeding profusely in Bulawayo after another thorough beating from the MDC-T thugs.

You hear and see all this and say: “Umm, Bishop indeed so, so much in just a few weeks.” Indeed, too much vanhu waMwari, but then mati madii? From the Blue Roof Mansion in the leafy low-density suburb of Borrowdale, former president Mugabe and “musikana wangu” Grace were cooking a dynamite of some sort. I never thought one day I would ask this question, but hey good people – what’s up with Bob? Hanzi chiiko nemudhara wedu? Is this what 94 minus 52 can do to one of independent Africa’s founding fathers?

Well, what the former president and his unrepentant wife are cooking is only dynamite insofar as it is likely to explode with devastating consequences right in their faces. Otherwise, to all right-thinking Zimbabweans they are cooking mbwezhu nedzimwe mbwende dzevanhu.

Pardon me dear congregants, ndiri kuramba ndongobatwa nesetswa. Kikikikikiki, kikikikikikiki, kikikikikiki, Ambrose Mutinhiri kikikikiki, kikikkikiki! Leader of a political party? Kikikiki! Your ex-wife Tracy akakuramba, saka tokuda kuti zvidii? Imi vanhu sekaiwo neni mhani! You know panoti timid? You know panoti deadhead? Panoti flat tyre? Welcome to Mutinhiri’s world of wonder!

Now if you think Mutinhiri is a big old joke, there is an even bigger monumental joke in this joke. The spokesperson of Mutinhiri’s supposed political party, is none other than the ever clever Jealousy Mawarire. Kikikikiki! Who is that musician who sang “anongori majokosi chete?” Jealousy of all the people? Yakakomborerwa zvayo Zanu-PF!

For those who can’t keep up with Jealousy’s political prostitution, this is that guy who in 2013 filed a case at the Constitutional Court challenging the then president Mugabe to set dates for Presidential and parliamentary elections. Morgan Tsvangirai at that time was enjoying himself in the Prime Minister’s Office and so was against the holding of elections. Jealousy did what he has always done and what he will soon do. Tsvangirai and his MDC-T were walloped by Zanu-PF. Kwanzi Tsvangirai akafa ane chigumbu chikuru kunaJerasi.

Anyway, Jealousy doesn’t really care. He moved to Mai Mujuru’s party. Just like we are laughing now, we laughed when we heard that Jealousy was part of Mai Mujuru’s media team. And Jealousy being Jealousy he didn’t waste time showing his true prostitution colours.

In April last year, after exhibiting some serious judo and karate moves on one Gift Nyandoro whom he was accusing of personalising Mai Mujuru, Jealousy left that little opposition party. Unfortunately and without any shame, he left Nyandoro with a broken leg and in a wheelchair.

This is the same Jealousy who is now the spokesperson of Mutinhiri’s supposed party. Mutinhiri hokoyo nema huuhaa, huuhaaa!

Maybe someone needs to sing Michael Jackson’s song “Money” to Jealousy. Bishop Lazarus wasn’t exactly a fan of that King of Pop but a few lyrics from the song will do a lot of good for Jealousy. It goes “. . . Money, money, money; Lie for it; Spy for it; Kill for it; Die for it!” MJ, as they called him, wasn’t done. With that shrill voice he went “. . . The thrill for the money; Are you infected with the same disease? Of lust, gluttony and greed?” Then the killer line: “If you want it, then earn it with dignity.” Woohh, kanga kakaoma kamwana kekwaJackson. Whoever fooled him to destroy his cute face with those stupid plastic surgeries?

Bishop Lazarus is adding a line to the song. But then “Jealousy won’t listen for the money!” Just keep watching the space. Jealousy has joined many opposition political parties and he has destroyed many. After leaving journalism, it has become a profession and an obsession for him to go after anything that threatens Zanu-PF’s hegemony.

But then let me not major on the minor. Mutinhiri and Jealousy are just dirty raw materials in the scheme of things. Even if they were to fart hard and loud, no one would really care a hoot about them.

This supposed Mutinhiri’s political party is actually Professor Jonathan Moyo’s project and Grace Mugabe’s dream. Poor Mutinhiri was roped in to give a semblance of a link to the liberation struggle since the G40 cabal has learnt the hard way that 38 years after the attainment of independence, the liberation struggle still has a strong bearing on the country’s identity. In the beginning they tried Dr Sydney Sekeramayi and for a while zvakaita kunge zvaita.

Former president Mugabe is in this project just because of 94 minus 52. It’s a true statement that; “as we grow old, we grow young”. Forgive the former president, but then what is Jonathan’s game plan?

The easy conclusion is that Jonathan wants the former president through Mutinhiri to divide Zanu-PF votes during the forthcoming elections. Well, yeah but Jonathan is more sinister than that. He has not yet abandoned his imperialistic agenda. Actually, Jonathan roped in the former president so that the former president could destroy himself first and then Zanu-PF eventually.

As I preach to you dear congregants, every right-thinking Zimbabwean is wondering, “Ko Mudhara Bob apindwa nei? Why can’t he take a deserved rest? Why is he now destroying his legacy?” Well, the former president won’t take that deserved rest because paita nyasire and mujambajecha. Jonathan nekoko, Grace nepapa. What do you expect the old man to do?

Which is why Bishop Lazarus always had this feeling that “Operation Restore Legacy” wasn’t taken to its rightful conclusion. That conclusion is right at the Blue Roof Mansion bedroom. Takasiya mudhara wedu in a tight corner with the greedy and insecure former First Lady.

If you think Bishop Lazarus is exaggerating, then how do you explain kuti the former president, our African icon, akanzi “shut up,” by the former First Lady as she was addressing workers at her company? All the former president had done was to ask, the former First Lady whether indeed she had paid the workers their dues. Can’t we see the former president is in serious trouble?

Now part two of Jonathan’s project – with everyone wondering what has gone wrong with the former president, Jonathan wants President Mnangagwa to lose his cool and go head-on with the former president. When this happens, Jonathan’s idea is for people to then turn around and say, “but why can’t President Mnangagwa see he is dealing with an old man? Why can’t he feel pity for the old man?”

In the end, the former president will destroy his legacy, he will be ill-treated by the current administration and President Mnangagwa will come out as a heartless leader. Let’s not be fooled.

Bishop Lazarus was alarmed when he saw some Zanu-PF youths last week chanting; “Pasi naMugabe!” No, no, no! Let’s not fall into Jonathan’s evil trap. That is exactly what he wants and we should never, ever give it to him.

Instead, let’s take “Operation Restore Legacy” to its rightful conclusion. Inzwa! Inzwa, manyepo. Hehe, Bishop is saying; “Grace and Mugabe, ngavarambaniswe.” Ummm, imi vanhu musamhanye. If that were to happen I don’t think anyone would shed tears, but my thinking is that as a matter of urgency we need to rescue the former president.

Ezekiel 12 vs 2 says: “Son of man, you live in the midst of the rebellious house, who have eyes to see but do not see, ears to hear but do not hear, for they are a rebellious house.” Former president Mugabe has been taken hostage in this rebellious house.

People like Father Mukonori, Father Ribeiro, Dr Gideon Gono and former presidents like Chissano, Mbeki and Kaunda among others should be dispatched to the Blue Roof Mansion to make the former president understand what is going on. These people should make the former First Lady understand the trouble she is putting herself into. All this is likely to end very, very bad for her.

After realising that “mudhara wedu” has fallen for their evil plan, Jonathan and his gangsters are now flying him to South Africa to make him believe. Surely, we can’t let Jonathan do this to the former president. If we let things go as they are, let’s brace for more embarrassing statements from the former president. It’s a blue lie that age is nothing but just a number.

Luke 12 vs 56 warns us all saying: “You hypocrites! You know how to analyse the appearance of the earth and the sky, but why do you not analyse the present time?” Let’s analyse the present time.

Bishop is out!

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